Edward Kamau Brathwaite(b. 1930)
Sonnet 1: "Helpless like this"
Helpless like this
leader-
less like this,
heroless,
we met you: lover,
warrior, hater,
coming through the files
of the forest
soft foot
to soft soil
of silence:
we met in the soiled
tunnel of leaves.
Click lock
your fire-
lock fore-
arm fire-
arm flashed
fire and our firm
fleshed, flame
warm, fly
bitten warriors
fell.
How long
How long
OLord
O devil
Ofire
O flame
have we walked
have we journeyed
to this place
to this meeting
this shock
and shame
in the soiled
silence
How long have we
travelled down
valleys down
slopes, silica
glinted, stones
dry as water,
to this flash
of flame in the forest.
O who now will help
us, help-
less, horse-
less, leader-
less, no
hope, no
Hawkins, no
Cortez1 to come.
Prempeh imprisoned,
Tawiah dead,
Asantewa2 bridled
and hung.
O who now can help
us: Geronimo, Tackie,
Montezuma3 to come.
And the fire, our
fire, fashioning locks,
rocks darker than iron;
fire betrayed us once
in our village; now
in the forest, fire falls
us like birds, hot pods
in our belly. Fire
falls walls, fashions
these fire-
locks darker than iron,
and we filed down the path
linked in a new
clinked silence of iron.