A Monumental Tree is Uprooted: An Elegy for a Fallen Commander

There are waterworks in Ghanaians’ faces
All are in deep blue, black and red dresses
Gathered together are persons of all ages
In diametric trauma are folks of all races.

The supreme tyrant has swiftly struck again
People are wailing irrepressibly, they are in pain
Their exertion to revive the peacemaker, is in vain
The strength of the enemy, they could not contain.

The man whose birth was just celebrated with infants
Has unexpectedly left his cherished infants orphans
The very bell that chimed to welcome the new entrant
Now tolls to bid unanticipated farewell to the defunct.

A monumental tree has indeed been uprooted
The journey of a humble mortal is completed
The educator extraordinaire has joined the departed
But his legacy par excellence continues unabated.

Life in villages, he meekly grasped
Life in towns, he readily observed
Life in cities, he proudly witnessed
Life abroad, he keenly experienced

But life in the afterlife, he never lived to tell.

Pain from friends, he courageously surpassed
Pain from countrymen, he boldly embraced
Pain from strangers, he valiantly survived
Pain from sickness, he bravely endured

But pain from heartless Death, he never lived to feel.

May the leader, the supreme epitome of humility
Who turned a lake of tears into a world of hilarity
And a brimful despair into a bottomless sanguinity
Now rest with his maker in perpetual tranquillity.



Emmanuel Sarpong Owusu-Ansah (Black Power) is an Investigative Journalist, a researcher and the author of Fourth Phase of Enslavement (2011) and In My End is My Beginning (2012). He may be contacted via email ([email protected]).