TALES MY GRANDMOTHER TOLD

The Forsaken Wife

A long time ago, in a world different from today’s there was a man who became impassive. He did not lose the will to live, on the contrary he had found a new lease unto life one that totally absorbed him and separated him from all humanity, he forgot the charm of a loving wife of youth, his friends, including his family.

Every day he woke up, just like any other day, in his village set at the outskirts of a great forest. He did the things he did as his waking up routine and then he set out to his task, everything seemed just normal. Except that he had had completely turned his back on the world, taken relations with kith and kin out of his daily considerations, and with passing day he seemed to recede ever further away.

He was not a lazy man who disdained hard work, on the contrary he has a hard working man who dedicated his labour to cultivating, maintaining and managing his palm tree plantation. He worked so hard and with such dedication that his plantation was a unique acclamation of impossible plausibility of how a single dedicated mind can make the impossible a veracity. His palm plantation thrived and was of such immense scale, that its excellent management was oft considered by other men as an act supernatural. However, he was simply a man dedicated to his task. Each day started early, he rose at third cock crow dorned his farming attire and set off to his farm where he worked all day.

Over many years of attending and cultivating palms, he had over years of experimentation and practice tapped into a honey vein of palm wine; tapping into a rare honeyed vein of sweetness most beguiling and had lost the fight to its intoxicating charm. A charming taste, so sublime in its smoky and light befuddlement on the senses that it tested the very taste buds, evoking new comparisons with each sip that even before one could think of fighting the battle to control imbibing this appealing liquor, the battle of who controls what is already lost.

Palm wine of honeyed taste, smilingly light, ice cold in tropical heat of the afternoon and retaining room temperature in the chill of evening, can call forth and does call forth, a teasing out, of that rare poetic inclined mind, many comparisons. A deceptive cycle of seeking to perfect a definition to liken the illusive taste to that can lead to new awarenesses only the alcoholic suffused mind can effortlessly engage.

There is a tale shared among the old folks of a sweet tap of the palm tree, one that is arcanely corruptible, a taste it is said, to be so milky, in its intoxication that even the sturdiest of minds having once imbibed that brew for non mortals was doomed to an addiction that no other substance in the world of men can quench.

It is said, by great travellers, in these regions that forest apes having come across such a palm, believed to be tapped at night by stray spirits that wander deep in the woods searching for a touch of humanly things, would spend the rest of their lives in a slow dance of forlorn happiness drinking at these palm till they all perish.

No one knows for certain when he came across this strain of palms, what everyone knew for certain, was that he became totally disinterested in the affairs of men, exactly two months after he got married. One moment he was a stalwart man of commendable resources, working and maintaining a compound of many relatives and a new wife, the next moment he was just tall shadowy figure of impassivity, who spent every waking hour on his farm.

His farm was a mighty plantation that was a measure of his strength as a man. When a group strangers came across its origins at the north western edge of the great river, it took them four days to meander their way through the palm plantation till they reached his farmer's hut set in the middle of the farm, where he retired in the heat of the afternoon for a rest and lunch. So impressed were the strangers that they befirended him to learn by what skills he could single handidly accomplish so much. He was one of a kind, a driven man, a man who set his purpose and will do everything and anything to achieve his goals. Such men were prodigious in their capacities, as travellers who braved unknown paths, in this one man's achievement of cultivation, they discerned a man who stood apart. His name was Gokunde. A son of powerful men who worked hard, tilling their land and trading. Advisor to rulers and wise men, he was scion of great and powerful rulers who had for hundreds of years lived in this fertile savannah region bordering the great forest to the north east.

There were men who were conscious of themselves and their personage, while others live life as best as they deem, others really live to reach out and spread a piece of their blessing. Gokunde started out by being the latter type, which is why his withdrawal was a social imposition, one that affected his family and made his community despair. He was first born in a family of three girls and five boys. Ten years ahead of his next sibling, he grew up in a loving family where his father passed on essential knowledge of manhood early in life and an adoring mother sheltered him in a way that made him daring beyond most normals. He sensed a pride of his mother in his father’s strength and ability to provide and generate a peaceful haven where many came and found it difficult to leave. When he went hunting with his father for the first time, many boys his age were still wetting their beds, when he struck the rich brown earth and planted his first seedlings beside his mother’s vegetable plot, it was with a sense of definitiveness, an intention of growing a better harvest than his mother; he was a child reared to become a worthwhile contribution to his community by every measure conceivable.

Maiden

Certain children are born in every generation who are special, they live a physical existence where dimensions cross pathways, because they are born assuming that is how others also perceive life and reality, they are often known and valued for their special gift, threated by their elders as just others, yet noticed for their special gifting. These children in the old times were allowed a lee way to interpret and interact with their environment through ancient wisdom that allows them a sense of normality in unusual circumstances. When Fo Yao and Da Abla, who lived three kilometres from the local market, in a neat, white house by the giant willows had their third daughter, it was rumoured that it rained yellow flowers for hours on end the very moment she entered the world of men. It was of course, the once in a decade flowering and shedding of the giant tropical willows that surrounded their house. But in these times, symbols, interpretations of signs and events of a special nature and beliefs permeated human thinking, assumed to be essential for understanding human circumstances.

Early on, even as a baby in a cot, her mother noticed she had a way of becoming quite when birds chirped and tended to follow keenly bird calls by orienting her focus to chirping of birds. She would giggle and gurgle in such a way that those with her almost believed that she was having an amusing discourse with these birds. More interestingly since her birth, rare birds, birds whose songs were of such intensity that many who had previoulsy not paid much attenttion to these things were notceably moved, would come at height of noon to sing at the window of whichever room she was being rested. Things took a turn for even more unexpected occurences when in her third month through to her sixth month after birth, when doe and two of her fawns would appear every evening, straight from the forest, and sit right beneath her window all through the night to morn. Since tradition forbids the hunting of young animals or lactating females with their young they were relatively safe from being pouched. However, it was the manner by which she attracted natures most protective nature that held everyone in awe.

She attracted nature in a way that requires a constant watch over her till she was well past ten years, at eight years, she went to fetch water from the giant basin, where water was kept and came to a terrified mother who was cooking dinner with a poison less water snake relaxed around her neck, she simply said, it doesn’t like the pot, it wants to be dropped by the riverside. A befuddled mother, not knowing what to say, told her auntie to lead her to the riverside, where she gently let go what in later stories that became a family lore, a smiling animal. She always was able to gap the world between men and nature in a profound and gentle way. Her giggles in childhood in between the cooing of the doves and song birds who flew and settled by her window, made her mother believe they told her interesting stories of the bird world.

She was sharper than most, faster on her long spindly legs than most boys and took on dares that left many boys in crumbling heaps of terrified tears. She was Amy. When the missionaries built a school, she turned up one fine morning and reported for school even before her parents had taught of sending her to school. Those of course were times when very few girls were allowed to attend school since it was considered a total waste of time for girls, since girls were supposed to acquire domestic training by staying close to the females in a family.

Amele (Amy)

On those occasions that she sang, her songs were a seeming force of nature that commands attention, calling forth a silence that descended on creation, her voice was like a tingling bell echoing off all hard surfaces, being absorbed by all absorbent surfaces, she sang and the world around her soaked her renewing songs, and was refreshened. When still a young girl, families from all round brought children who were disturbed for all kinds of reasons and had been crying days so her singing could lull them to rest, she had a soothing gift from her creator to re-establish broken and frayed ends, ameliorating balance when there was imbalance amidst creation.

Da Abla an industrious housekeeper who run a small local industry of baking and selling local cakes made from strained corn, which is a local delicacy together with different sauces, kept a disciplined household. She employed and offered training to a few local girls, mainly relations, to enable them acquire a skill to support themselves and their families. It is normal that on weekends, younger girls will carry wares on their heads and stroll through the lanes of the village to advertise their products and allow ease of access to those who will otherwise not make the trip to purchase at source.

It was task that most children enjoy since it allows them to test their skills at being the best sales person or the luckiest sellers. The third child is always a charmed baby, a child of re assurance to her parents, in this Amy was a blessing to her mother. Everything she touched blossomed, healed or was revived, if Da Abla was successful in her food business, her third daughter's arrival increased her business in myriad and manifold ways.

When Amy went with her relatives to peddle baked cakes, spicy sauce and fried fish, she outsold them and then took over and sold theirs. She was natural leader, who smiled her way through life and made the world smile along with her. Her friends preferred to call her Amy instead of the formal Amele.

Marriage

When it came to marriage and its arrangement thereof in this settlement, there were only two ways, either a young man fell in love or his parents arranged a marriage for him, either way, parental approval was a paramount factor to successful marriage, for one did not only marry a person but marriage brought families together.

Gokunde’s mother was the quiet type who gently weaved her way into everyone’s business, she was already on the look out for a well bred, sturdy girl from close family links who could be introduced to Gokunde in a manner that would allow him to think it was all by his own initiative. Thus, it was that one bright morning, just before he had fully prepared for the day, a gentle knock on his door revealed a local beauty of prodigious proportions; a young lady in her prime, vibrant and gushing forth with that essence of youthful vivacity that could throw most men off their head, for Gokunde it was a lightning bolt that unsettled him, lifting him several thousand meters off the ground and for many months filled his head with a glorious appreciation of an apparition beauty of unearthly proportions.

The strong emotions of love are a stormy churning of the heart and mind, unsettling and totally maddening for the youth, it is on such strong currents of unbridled emotions that set a sparkle of fervour leading to a beautiful madness of the heart riven from its foundation of reason, an exulted state of merged beings, perceiving through their love, nature's more benign nature. A state of being that for a time held these two on a journey of self discovery in which reality was totally oblivious to them.

Maybe the only reprieve of first love is its limited overwhelming span, one could not live all of life in such a daze of abnormality where the flowers exuded a more romantic frangrance, the blue skies assume more azure shades and a head on a partners bosom caused a descent to dream worlds of poetic flagrance. Its only reprieve is that after that period one could look back, and in rememebring acknowledge how emotionally driven, life festered in love, could be for a time an opiate that trancends dreary existence.

First love is a cellar of dearly held experiences that the mind and heart in matured years of turbulence, where the worried and harried souls returns to claim pleasant memories and for a time allow its joy to permeate the bitterness of maturity and its trials.

Tapping

Tapping a palm tree is an act of patient nurturing that over many days allow a palm tree to yield its wine of milky delight, when that wine first pours forth, leaking in a gentle white stream of controlled flow, its sweetness is intense. When the first wine pours forth it is a non alcoholic sweet drink that even children can drink with innocent delight. Over the next few days when it is in storage, this sweet drink matures into a strong intoxicating liquor that makes fools of sturdiest of minds, when taken in excess.

There are certain men who do not seem to have a limitation on what they are capable of, their natural strength predisposes them to go for, go forth, and dare far, further more, than others do. When they over perform they hardly notice they have moved far beyond what others less capable are capable of. These men often do not seek nor take a cue from those around them; these are those who in best of circumstances define the path lesser men follow.

Gokunde had tapped a sweet vein that made him feel wholesome, hale and hearty, he was lost between hard tilling of the soil, nurturing his vast plantation and providing for his household of extended relatives. There was never a lack of basic necessities in his house, each morning he rose and went about what was expected of a man in his community. He was never much of a talkative and when he sank deeper into himself, by the time his impassivity became a disturbing isolation, he was already far gone. He ventured deeper into the great forest and brought bigger game, his farm increased in size and hard work of an intense nature firmed and toned a body nourished by the palm's abundant vitamin. It was a sweet wine of destruction, albeit subtly.

Orange Sunsets

An ill wind had blown across the vast forest regions, crossing mountain ranges, it came suddenly upon their village, set at the edge of the great forest and the beginning of the vast savannah. In all ages there were people who did terrible, evil things, under questionable pretexts. In this case a wicked group of idol worshippers had grown strong over time, they raided quite villages, where people for many generations had lived at peace and had virtually laid down their war tools.

Suddenly these quite settlements at the edge of the great forest begain losing kith and kin to a band of murdering marauders. These human afflictions come in all places and at all times, they may come as conquering, warring tribes or aggresive adventurers, they all had one thing in common; whichever guise they assume, their activities disrupt quite existence and carve a bloody emotional chasm of destruction and human suffering in the wake of their destructive activities. Sorrowing farmers and herders had lost relations who were sacrificed with a bloody violation of human sanctity to appease a blood thirsty entity; an entity devised of madmen and their twsited minds, who had grown into ravaging packs of blood thristy vermins who desecrated the country side withan avaricious destruction they assume the nature of a wild untamable forest fire, raging and consuming everthing in its path. It was as though suddenly, a lining separating light and darkness had broken and leaked a dark inky substance into the light, blurring clarity and reason and spreading unfathomable fear over the whole tract.

These raids affected many villages with sporadic, unexpected, capture of women and children on isolated paths, who were never seen of or heard from again. 

In the depth of night, a steady, throbbing, frenzied, disturbing drumming, was heard deep in the forest, it continued for hours with a frenzy that chilled every soul and made for long uneasy nights. Villages organised night patrols and families warned relations to always move in groups. These were unsettling times indeed.

These abominations that emerge from darkness may wield an influence of terror for a time but, eventually, societies and communities come together to uproot and wipe them out of living memory but until that time their terror is a debilitating social-stability undermining influence.

Unequalled joy

When a relation begins it is a period of beautiful wrap around of two souls intertwined in intense emotions of a thing, deeply experienced but poorly articulated, a thing uplifting, simplistic in its powerful bonding effect on two humans, it is a short period of mutual involvement, to live life, in love forgetting, the world outside, which then exists only as a means to give a perfect background for feeding that love. Meanwhile the pair are borne on a voyage beyond reason deep into psyche's world of silly things that assume prodigious intensity of shared joy. In other words, while most humans go around their hum drum existence, new loves exist in a state of enhanced sublimation, far removed from reality, a phased out existence filled with joy, unparalleled. Alas, it is a limited period of unequalled joy, afterwards comes familiarisation, when routines fall into place and two or more humans share a common space of managed existence, when mundane reality shifts back into focus.

Shady

In the heat of the afternoon, when the sun had climbed its highest, a stillness descends upon the land, a palpable stillness of intense weariness as the sun pours heat upon the tropics, an energy so intense and pure that it sates every other form of energy and inspires quietness as every living thing seeks escape to shady places for an hour or two.

They came, when every once was least susceptible, they came as a shadow, and as quiet as a shadow, they dragged a woman preparing her husband’s dinner in the shade of a giant “agbo” tree, she was trust unceremoniously into a huge sack and cast over shoulder’s of wicked men, huge men who live to cause chaos, whose day do not end until a violent act has desecrated the sanctity of life. These agents who have disrupted quiet lives spent in wholesome peace. They took Gokunde’s wife away, away from her homestead, her children and those she loved and who could not consider life without her. The uproar was deafening and when the search began it was bound never to end until it was confirmed where she was.

Trussed

She was bound and gagged, trussed like a turkey for the roast by these wicked souls. She was thrown into a dark and dank room, till it was late in the night, then they set her amidst a circle of drums. Words had gone round her friends in the forest and grassland, that she had been caught by these wicked men and all the forest creatures informed by the birds who saw everything happening had been drawing closer and closer, till the bullies were a silent gathering amidst nature aroused to protect one of its kindred spirits.

A talent is a rarity among the mundane, such a rarity comes once in a generation if creation is favourable, that is why every community values its unique blessings when such unique souls come along. These are the healers, the leaders, the discoverers, the creative who through uncommon insight open new chapters in human achievements.

There is a bird of the savannah who sings one song when the sun is at its highest, a bird of brightest fuschia, it’s cry is never heard at night, when it sings, a sudden hush sweeps through the sun soaked land, and no other noise is heard, just the silence ringing with its after call. The cry of the noon bird had never been heard in the depth of the night, so when it called that night, the night Amy was trussed, tossed unto a pile of stacked firwoods, denied of dignity, daubed in ochre and white chalk to be wasted for the whims of a few mad marauders, every one with ears to hear knew strange things were afoot.

A sorrow of a kind hitherto unknown among men had suffused very nature, its sad songs were borne deep into the depths of the earth, where fire ants held a court of unceasing activity. One of theirs had been netted and their army was called to the rescue. An army of a million fearsome fire ants had began a match that had only one goal, to scatter their enemy and turn their camp to dust. A million, million tiny feet had been called forth for, When they marched, an earthquake rolled across the forest floor.

Amy was tied to a post, set amidst amidst a group of drummers, a mighty fire razed around her, her mouth had been taped shut for so long, when it was loosened and a warm cup of fetid water offered her it only dribbled through lips that had lost movement and lost sensation. As water dribbled from her lips, her sorrow filled heart welled with a strength of defiance and anger and then her song burst forth and a burdened heart gave vent to a song that filled the night.

Gokunde, Gokunde, dearest of husband

My beloved husband, long dead to the world

Where are you when I need you most

Why have you left me alone

With these marauders who beset nature with such vile atrocity ?

You were meant to protect me, 

to keep safe from these vile elements

Now, here I am all tied up to be sacrificed,

Food for an idol made of wood

I am alone, lost and without you

You who were meant to protect me

You have left me all alone

In my hour of greatest need

Fodder for these maniacs –

How many times have I told you

How many times have I tenderly sought to awaken you

From your dream world of palmwine

To a reality you refused to acknowledge

That a drunken man cannot protect his household

Now here I am and you are no where to be found

Far from all help

You are far from me

Lost in a haze of deception

And I am so close to a violent end-

It was a song sang by a pure soul in distress, it rang clear like the song of the lark and everything in nature was drawn to its appeal. The crow sang it in the wrong key, the cacabou cawed it and a shudder was felt through the under growth and all this while the ants drew ever closer to the clearing in the forest.

Ant Army

A million, million ants in formation, marched to one steady beat and the forest floor vibrated to their steady rhythm, a wave of great strength coming forth reassuring to some and a warning to all, those who could climb, rose graceful into the boughs and other creatures closed their entry holes and doors, the majority raced ahead, heading to a place where something unusual was afoot.

The commander of the ant rmy was a rugged, rickty, old, battle hardened, cogger, the kind of old dudes, who said few words, grimaced and spotted a rarely lighted end of arm thick tobacco, sticking and weaving up and down the side of their mouth. This morning he had been with his grand daughter, a dainty little one, he was really fond of.

”Grandpa, Grand pa, how is your army doing?”

”Just fine my dear, in good shape and sharp to the very last man”

”Hmm, will I get to meet some handsome captain one these days?.”

Hahaha, the old man laughed, ”How quickly you grow.”

”I will decide who will have that honour, my dear.”

A hard knock was heard on the door and a spindly messenger, was ushered in, who in a few words, informed the commander that the whole valley was under undesirable influences, influences, who had just ccaptured and bound the wife of Gokunde with a intent to sacrifce her to their vile deception of an idol at full moon.

The agile old cogger called a meeting of elders and laid out an attack plan to once and for all rid the valley of these undesirables and teach them a lesson to boot. The colony was on war footing, every fit man was called to rank and the support divisions and friendly alliances with the wasps was called forth to make use of their flight capacity to gain an air advantage. If anything at all, this army lived to its reputation and motto of ”ever prepared”.

Before he departed for war, a justified war, to save a worthy life, her grand daughter asked her

”Grandpa, why are we inteferring in the affairs of humans?”

”They don’t understand our ways and we for the most part live a life hidden from their awareness, so why would you risk so many ants just to save a woman’s life?”

”Well, child, to fully understand the complex interdependency of nature at its various hiarearchies, you need a few more years and some grey hair, so simply put, understand that, every now and then, comes along a rare human who can undersatnd our language, through whom we teach men a better way of balancing their existence with their environment. She, whose life is at stake, to be wasted by the mad men we intend to drive away, is one of those. The last time we had one such human, no humans lived in these vast forests and its adjoining savannah, just a story told by old ants of times long gone by when men and animals lived closer. Now, child we know those legends have been confirmed in this precious life at risk, so to her rescue we go, far too much rests upon her, more than she knows and more than any human will ever understand.”

The young inquiring mind wasn’t about to let the old one to get off so easy, after all she was a favourite grand daughter and she knew how older men could weasel themselves out of tough questions by putting on a mask for a face and evocating idioms in vocabularly so archaic and double layered in meaning that even ancestors would be tested in interpreting.

”What exactly would be a shared philosophic platform for ants and men, since you mentioned it?”

He smiled the knowing smile of an old chess player who knew that his next move would end a game that could very well be become a lock down of intricate moves.

”For one, if we could get her to tell her husband, the one with a knack for brewing that sweet palm wine that, a hundred fifty meters beneath his farm runs an old river of imeasurable capacity, and if he could be convinced that there is a dry season of low rains that would stretch for a few years and he by digging several hundred wells will keep his farm flourishing, then we could continue to dwell in our present community. However, we are the only specie that can inteprete signs in our environment to know these future seasonal tendency and she is the only one who can understand us and has the wiles to convey that information to her husband in a manner that would make him work at, what at present would appear to be a futile endeavour. Besides, she has managed to talk that party of wicked old aardvarks that have decimated our colony for these past five years, she has told them of better feeding several days journey away from our present anthill, so, now were you talking of shared philosophic platform or just simply living in peace by supporting one another, my dear?”

The astounded young woman, had pearly beautfiful eyes and they had just grown double in size.

For wisdom sake the old man had to make a lasting impression on a willing mind.

”You know, child, what we know is only as good as the good it enbales us to accomplish, we know something because we are so predisposed, it could have greater value if humans could be given that knowledge since they tend to make the greatest difference with it, both to their specie and to ours, after all, we share a common destiny.”

He could feel it in his bones, that this was a major slam dunk, in passing of knowledge and it put a bounce in his already springly steps.

”Heigh, ho, Ants, ready at arms, forward march!”

She smiled to herself, as she turned to go back to vist a friend and then return home.

She thought to herself

”Far too many hypothetical assumptions in that one, Old man thinks he’s got the better of me on this one, I’ll wait till he comes back from his rescue mission, more likely this maneuvre may be a balm for his ageing muscles, a needed confirmation of manhood, a reassurance that he is still the toughest alpha male ant to thread these grasslands and forests, than all that grand unified theory of specie interdependency.”

She knew that all life on the planet had a shared outcome, right from the earth from which they build their communities to the very air and its well adjusted pressure in which the live. Maybe there is a level at which different living things could work for a better environment. She dug into her side pocket came up with a perfeclty shape apple, bit deep into it and contemplated its nature; a seed tossed into the soil, it absorbs its nutrients from the soil, these nutirents come from parent rocks, minute minerals, from decayed matter, the air and through complicated chemical processes of activated genes preprogrammed, it becomes a plant, that continues to use its unique environment and its resources to enable a growth process that results in a fruit. All of a sudden the apple tasted even sweeter. She promised herself to give it some further thought, now she wants the men back from their mission as soon as possible with as little loss as possible.

She loved this community, it was a steady twenty degrees Celcius in the shade all time of the year, it was constructed to let in just enough light and no more, so when one walked along its boulveards, there was a constant play of light and shadow, a seductive calmness that creates a cocoon of safe haven, away from the outside and its dangers, dangers mainly from big predators who at a slick could crack hundreds of ants for snack. Yet, even as she knocked on her friend’s door she still could not get rid of the nagging thought of shared destiny on a planet and its varied species.

If "Grandpa" had been seeking a satisfaction, how much greater would have his joy been if only he were to know that a few words in conversational exchange with a grand niece had set in motion a quest for understanding that would define one of ant world’s leading social philosphers on a certain morning, when all he wanted was to come up tops in a one off argument.

Mass Attack

The ants had massed together and the commander issued attack directions, the pratroopers would climb all the tall trees encircling the enemy clearing, at a given order they would drop like a bitter rain of pain, stinging heads, shoulders, and bellies with a raging fire that would be supplemented by infantry ground attack that would turn the whole ground to a field of fiery fire ants, their aim would be exposed lower body parts and a mass of leg bites that would make maintaining a steady foothold a painful experience.

So! At the word, attack! A fiery stream of fire ants stormed from locations all round the clearing and set to biting exposed body parts of the bullies with such ferocity that it was like a stream of hawain lava had exploded from unexpected underground sources and was raining a brime stone of hot rocks. Initially, the drumming increased, assuming such a frenzy of ferocious thumping that no one could remain standing still, then came the second wave of reactions; a helter skelter running from one end of the circle to the other, then followed a series of uncoordinated but from a passive observer's perspectve well executed vertical hops not altogether unlike the famous jumps of masai warriros doing their vertical hops. Finally, unable to control the bites and their fiery anguish causing pain, out of mind men run and threw thmeselves into the burning log fire, substituting one burn for another. No one, on location, was exempt. 

The fiery ants were so zealous in their attack, no one had escaped their traumatic descent and rallied ground attack, wave after wave they came, bit, dropped their stings and left fewer fresh spots for the burning nibbles rolling from ranks moving from behind to take another bite. As for  the clumsy dummies, bullies, long used to using their bulk to bully other men found that when it came to the little things of the world, they were completely outwitted.

A Man to The Rescue

Gokunde had awaken fom a haze of palmwine induced dream to a strange call, her wife was singing stringently, a song of such prfound lament that it had stilled nature. He woke with a start, into an awareness that the life of his deeply cherished wife could be in harm ways, borne by a combination of shame, bravery and a few other undiscerned forces of nature, he stumbled with a huge clearing cutlass and moved towards a piercing song of such clarity the very leaves vibrated on branches of froedt trees, he was a moving wave of emotion, hacking a path through thick forest and thick undergrowth, his only prayer, was "Lord, let her song not cease!" and that song held its high note of desperation. Such an intensity of emotion that every note moved every heart and brought tears to even hardest of hearts.

For Gokunde, there was only a haze of desperate fear that this might be one time when he responded too late. Through bushes, through stubbles, through swamps, knocking down trees, swinging on forest llianas, he moved towards a song coming from the deepest part of the forest, and when he burst through into a clearing of melee and confusion, of grown men muttering, hopping and running in cycles, he was a man who had been transmogrified into a warrior, he only saw "red" and had eyes only for the object of his love, a dear wife, who had become a lady in distress. He completed what the ants had begun, he cut and hacked and pierced, with no evil or wickedness fore intetioned, he was simply, in a subconcious state of awareness, ridding earth of these verminous vandals, for all time. Their lack of respect for decency and life had pushed him beyond reason and he operated on only one principle to establish dominance and unequivocal victory, what that victory is, is a consideration he was not ready to consider. 

He hopped onto a crude platform of firewood and as he cut away binding cords holding his dearly beloved wife, could hardly suppress a terrible image of his beautiful, beloved wife dissovling as plast of flesh in searing wood fire. He shuddered at the taught and in a mighty heave lifted Amy unto manly shoulders and leapt down, he kicked the fire before him and pushed a smouldering leg out of the fire, as sparks rose, he saw a sight that few men would ever set eyes on, the "fire ant brigade" was a colloidal mass covering every inch of branch encircling the circle of doom. He sensed that nature had been fighting for him this very night and what he intended to be a silent acknowledgement of gratitide, came forth as a burst of relieve, a manly roar that moved through the trees and reached a settlement far away. 

Back to his village, men exhaled and an old woman smiled feebly.

The end.