Vanity by Birago Diop
The Poem
If we tell, gently, gently
All we shall one day have to tell,
Who then will hear our voices without laughter,
Sad complaining voices of beggars
Who indeed will hear them without laughter?
If we cry roughly of our torments
Ever increasing from the start of things,
What eyes will watch our large mouths?
Shaped by the laughter of big children
What eyes will watch our large mouths?
What heart will listen to our clamouring?
What ear to our pitiful anger
Which grows in us like a tumour
In the black depth of our plaintive throats?
When our Dead come with their Dead
When they have spoken to us with their clumsy voices;
Just as our ears were deaf
To their cries, to their wild appeals
Just as our ears were deaf
They have left on the earth their cries,
In the air, on the water, where they have traced their signs
For us, blind, deaf and unworthy Sons
Who see nothing of what they have made
In the air, on the water, where they have traced their signs.
And since we did not understand our dead
Since we have never listened to their cries
If we weep, gently, gently
If we cry roughly of our torments
What heart will listen to our clamouring,
What ear to our sobbing hearts?
Content Analysis
Birago Diop in this poem VANITY expresses his belief as an African man in the existence of our ancestors after their death. He bemoans the neglect of our ancestors by we Africans and our refusal to heed the voices of our ancestors.
In stanza one, the poet expresses his doubt in any response to our complaint from any quarter but makes us a laughing stock.
‘Who then will hear our voices without laughter?’
The complaint from Africans is put thus, ‘sad complaining voices of beggars’.
The poet in essence is saying that our failure to appease our ancestors lead us into woes and dooms’ hence we are made laughing stocks.
In stanza two, the poet says that if we lodge our complaints, problems and torments from time immemorial,
‘what eyes will watch our large mouths’.
The mouth is full of a lot of complaints and we are being made jest of.
The third stanza starts with a rhetorical question,
‘what heart will listen to our clamouring?’
This means, who is going to listen carefully and patiently and also reason along with us and understand our plight? The stanza also expresses the pitiable conditions of Africans and compares the extent of anger in Africans with tumours.
‘Which grows in us like a tumour’?
According to the poet, the neglect of the ancestors brings sorrow and hardship to Africans. These ancestors also cry out their warnings but are not heeded.
‘When they have spoken to us in their clumsy voices’.
‘Clumsy voices’ can be compared with the voice of the masquerades and other ancestors. The voices are not still heeded and they left their voices in the air, thunder, on the water like Yemoja and other gods.
The last stanza expresses the result of our disobedience to our ancestors that nobody will listen to our clamourings and complaints
Themes
Vanity: Africans refuse to listen to the voices and calls of our ancestors as a result of worldly affairs occasioned by western civilization, these worldly affairs are referred to as vanity.
Belief in the Ancestors: The poet’s persona shows much belief in the power of the ancestors and believes that their neglect has brought a lot of problems to Africans with nobody to come to their aid. According to the poet, the ancestors are capable of protecting Africans from all sorts of danger.
The theme of Neglect: This reflects in how Africans neglect their ancestors and run after the mundane. This neglects led Africa to a lot of problems. Despite the voices and the signs left behind by their ancestors, Africans neglect their cultures and customs, running after western civilization.
Persecution: As a result of the neglect of our ancestors, our culture and customs, Africans find themselves in a lot of problems and persecution with nobody to help us.
Poetic Devices
Repetition: Repetition is used in a poem for emphasis purposes. Some expressions are repeated in the poem to describe how Africans neglect the voices of their ancestors and the results e.g. lines 8&10’what eyes will watch our large mouths?’
Lines 11&29 ‘what ear will listen to our clamouring?’
Lines 6&28 ‘If we cry roughly of our torments’.
Some words and phrases are also repeated e.g.
If we, what, who, when? Etc.
Rhetorical Question: This is an expression in form of a question and does not require any answer. This is used in the poem to show the response of the people to the clamourings of Africans as a result of the neglects of the ancestors e.g.
Lines3, ‘Who then will hear our voices without laughter?’
5,’Who indeed will hear them without laughter?’
8&10, ‘What eyes will watch our large mouths?’
11&29, ‘What heart will listen to our clamouring?’
12,’ what ear to our pitiful anger
30,’ What ear to our sobbing hearts?’
It is used extensively in the poem to tell us that Africans bear their burdens alone; nobody is ready to come to their aid.
Simile: This is a figure of comparison. We can see this in line 13.
‘Which grows in us like a tumour’.
This compares the anger in Africans with a tumour.
Personification: This is when the qualities of an animate object is given to the in-animate object as we have in line 12
‘what ear to our pitiful anger’. Anger is personified here.
Lines 15&16, when our Dead come with their Dead’.
16,’when they have spoken to us with their clumsy voices’. Dead is personified here.
Synecdoche: This is when a part is used for a whole or a whole is used for a part.
In the second stanza, ‘eyes’ and’ mouth’ are used, and in the third stanza, heart and ear are used to represent a human being.
Biblical Allusion: The title and the content of the poem are similar to a verse in the Holy Bible Ecclesiastes 1:2’Vanity of vanities, saith the preacher: all is vanity’. Africans neglect their ancestors, running after western civilization which is vanity.
Language: The beauties of the poem are in its usage of language. The poet makes use of the appropriate figures of speech to bring out the message of the poem.
Enjambment: The poem runs on lines. One line leads to the other.