To My Uncle Tarkwa Atta – A Tribute (27)

Uncle Tee,
you make the presidency
seem so ravishingly
cheap,
it is a pity
there is only one
of your kind
at a time…
nobody ever told me
all you have to do
to be president
is to bang
two dunce caps,
cymbal style,
and get the people
hailing you
to the high heavens…
you committed
the most horrific
of mentacides,
and yet
the people think
you were the finest
gentleman since
jumbo-jet lipped
Kofi Abrefa,
the man who could
have really
been fatally felled
by verbal
abuse,
if the sound
of words
were a gun –
yes,
you committed
the most horrific
of mentacides;
and yet,
the people
are weeping
rivulets of tears
and blaming themselves
for your careless
concern for your
own well-being…
some even see
your blood
on their hands,
though you never
even once met
with them,
nor were you even
aware of their lives –
such is the surreal
splendor of
the presidency in
our part of
this world
in which
we live
in it,
Uncle Atukwei…
now I see
the nonesuch greatness
with which
you are linked
in the minds
of my
kinsmen
and
women;
it is written
almost illegibly
on the inner-top
of a Snapple
juice-drink bottle:
“'Real Fact' #784:
'The human brain is
about 80% water'”…
you must be
greatly enjoying
the debate
of the two dunces
in which one
accuses the other
of killing you
by woefully failing
to pour honey
in your
cancer-wracked
throat…
for my part,
though,
I am tempted
to committing
an act of sacrilege,
Uncle Tee,
not that I care
that much,
anyhow…
anyway,
since you were
widely known
to neither smoke
nor drink,
did you,
perchance,
overindulge yourself,
just a tad bit,
by scrubbing
Naadu's
you know
what I mean
with your tongue,
since
that has been known
to also cause
the disease
that sadly
took you away
from us…
well,
I don't know if
this mid-morning
incrimination
and
recrimination
has anything
to do
with the fact
of your being
born
a m'agya tuw…
you know,
for other than
my good old
Uncle Kofi,
with whom I share
same birth date,
who plays more
to the far-right
of Kotoko than
Abusua Dwarfs,
you folks
are not
generally known
to withstand
a lot
of heat,
and thus
your mocking
nickname of
m'agya tuw,
my overlord
the gun…
yes,
Uncle Tee,
you created
a flagrant legacy
of mentacide,
and now
you are gaily
reaping
a bumper
harvest of
muck…
8/9/12