An Empowering Ode to the Interim President Of Southern Cameroons: Mr. Julius Ayuk Tabe

 PREVAIL

Prevail in the pitch darkness of tempestuous nights

As the incandescent lighthouse emits its radiance From the distant horizon whereof sea monsters Team up and swim offshore in violent splashes Amidst vexing cataracts and hurricanes. Prevail through thick and thin Across the narrow path of the wild Overladen with weaving weeds, thickening thorns And dreadful deeps of antiquity Harbouring sundry reptiles in mangrove swamps.

Prevail while in their sacred sanctuaries, Pseudo-prelates pray for you with concealed pretence After eating the bread of the heathen, Drinking the wine of the desecrated vineyard And putting on the gabardine of the damned. Prevail with leaps and bounds Where greed and treachery have failed to deliver the goods For the welfare and wellbeing Of your disillusioned denizens Who will for nothing else than their freedom sacrifice their lives. Prevail while that grandfather in Ekondo-Titi Majestically inhales stuffy snuff into his sunken nostrils And that grandmother in Acha-Tugi Proudly puffs serpentine fumes from her age-battered pipe As they impatiently await the wake of October.

Prevail at God speed, mindful that More than eight million Southern Cameroons people Count on this trying transitional period More than any journey on which they have ever embarked, And more than any project which they have ever engaged. Prevail while our predecessors in their endless sleep In home and overseas sepulchres speak in unison For the restoration of our independence Whereof our children and their children's children Shall harvest their livelihood till time incalculable. Prevail while your energy is still at its peak, For the race of life is short, And the chosen have just a dash To accomplish their lifelong tasks For which they are assigned from their births. Prevail while the world at large marvels And historians chronicle that you were the interim torchbearer Of an independent nation once enslaved for fifty-six years Now emerging as one of the English-speaking countries On the tropics of the African continent to be reckoned with.

Prevail while from their heavenly dominions, The Angels in their immaculate white chariots, Sing the eternal glory of God For sending an illustrious son of your sanity To come to the timely rescue of a subjugated people. Prevail while I sit painfully in my termite-hued cubicle And compose a line or two from my overflowing fountain For the exaltation of this glaring galore on our doorsteps, For it is the divine calling of a studious artisan of my fidelity.

Nkwetatang Sampson Nguekie CEO, Library of Writers & Readers Global Lebialem County, Southern Cameroons.