Born in Dahomey (now known as Benin) in June 1935 and a former director of Radio Dahomey, Emile Ologoudou was also a teacher and journalist. He has produced several books of poems.

---

Liberty

Ologoudou

The white carcasses

of

ships

sought desperately

the visible land with its golden mist,

the native isle of insurrection,

stage at evening of the most tragic adventures,

we were tossed

on the waves of the same sorrow,

and discord

had not yet blown towards us the sands

of

its evidence,

exuberance still reigned over the happy bay,

that day when we made long funerals

for all the things

we had to bury.

Translated by Gerald Moore and Ulli Beier

*Third World Resurgence No. 300, August 2015, p 48