The Okigbo Foundation in Nigeria, an offshoot of THE CHRISTOPHER OKIGBO SOCIETY created by Obiageli in Belgium is putting together an anthology CROSSROADS to commemorate the fortieth anniversary of his demise (of which I hope my bulk submissions may be considered from). Among the editors are the erudite, charismatic and energetic Dr Umelo Ojinma of the Nassarawa State University, the versatile scholar and social commentator Patrick Tagbo Ogujiorfor and writer-critic E E Sule e.t.c.

 

The Emman Usman Shehu led ANA Abuja has since held a literary evening in his honour and many such activities are going on worldwide at the moment.

 

To end this piece however, my own humble tribute to the memory of Christopher Okigbo, a fellow poet and literati and a celebration of  my chance encounter with his enchanting heiress, let me return you to once more to Obiageli, the one on whose shoulders lives the burden of keeping his memory alive!

The first step Obiageli took after sufficiently dousing her soul in her father’s poetry was to set up the earlier cited Okigbo Society whose first task was to re-publish his two poetry collections LABYRINTHS and COLLECTED POEMS, which has not been printed for about two decades. Through Labyrinths, where she discovered the father she never really knew, she also discovered herself. And this discovery further saw her tracing his beaten path to the very place of his birth OJOTO near Onitsha, to the stream that gave the world the poem Heavensgate, popular like the unforgettable beginning of Ben Okri‘s Man Booker wining novel THE FAMISHED ROAD for the following :

 

before you, mother Idoto

naked I stand

before your watery presence

a prodigal

 

 

Being reborn thus, metaphorically and symbolically speaking, she proceeded to the very successful exhibition of her paintings LABYRINTHS REVISITED. And all that her father did in LABYRINTHS, she replicated in her work i.e. synonymous to the seven poetic structures of the rainbow in the poetry collection. Reminds you of the Natalie and Nat king Cole duet doesn’t it? Cool!

 

In a trunk inherited from her Uncle Pius, she had discovered the poem dance of he painted maiden dedicated to her very self at six weeks! A much treasured heirloom you’d agree. Not having known your father could be one of the most painful experiences in life and even more painful for this daughter was when she first heard her daddy‘s voice in a recorded tape at the Schaumburg Centre for Research in Black Culture in New York. Hear Obiageli:

 

It was almost a morbid experience.

I was older than my father was when

I heard his voice. I was expecting to hear

the voice of a dad, even though I know he

was a young man when he died, so it was

    a double shock to hear a very young voice.

    I didn’t recognise that voice and it didn’t trigger any memory.

 

The story of Christopher Okigbo, analogous to the Biafran story is equally the Nigerian Nation story. We still live with that collective loss, that collective suspicion of one another, making that collective and individual /tribal-socio-political bigger better mistakes, like the summation of Okri‘s Famished Road… building and decimating civilisations and ourselves, BLAMING THE WEST FORVER like Chimamada Adichie recently acknowledged via her character Richard’s note: The world was silent when we died in her Orange prize winning novel HALF OF A YELLOW SUN till  all the seas run dry and the birds tumble from the skies  and Abikus and Ogbanjes cease   their cyclical odysseys into the world and mankind is no more!

 

To my friend, Obiageli Ibrahimat Annabel Okigbo: May 12 Angels guide you!