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CHIMAMANDA OF THE EAST | a poem by John Kote

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Ada 'Amanda
The rising sun of the East 
I have never seen you
But you are before me in words and rhetoric glitters, wearing the feminist shame in patriarchy's hall of fame
Telling tales by moonlight
We gather at your feet with Purple Hibiscus, that flower violent Kambili must not crush
Holding to tenets of old to break bones

We gather at your feet for stories about history
As the night travels, maybe we can catch a glimpse of Half of the Yellow Sun before sunrise
Before guns and gunpowder contour our lives with layers of loss
Fighting for Biafra

You are not a single story
Patience and pain have courted you to the gravestones of dearly beloved
Grief is not brief, take notes

You too have seen smiles
Have smiled smiles
Accompanied by loud ovations and every tiny trigger of laughter
That crackles here and there around tables of literary talks 
You have charted a course
A literary walk
Chimamanda of the East

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