| ESIABA IROBI Helen, Not of Troy
(For
Helen)
When we met, suddenly, in the School Office, that evening, after winning the research fellowships, our over-activated brains fizzling with dreams and illusions of becoming great scholars, you were dressed in shorts and black stockings, a white blouse, rings on your fingers, but no lipstick on, how could we have known that as we jaw-jawed about teaching in Russia and holidays in Hungary, Nigeria or Ghana, that I was undressing you mentally, inch by inch, from crown to toe, peeling your dress with my mind, your skin, with my tongue, and with my teeth, the buttons of your blouse? I imagined, with a palpitating heart, and as things popped out or simply exploded, how we could start our mornings, if we lived together: Bakhtin as foreplay, Althusser as main course, and Derrida as dessert. Recalling your picture on the glassed board, in the corridor, your lipstick bold and strong, your excited mouth nearly open, the genital echo of your red lips beckoning like Susannah Moore’s platform shoes – as Germaine Greer, gifted scholar of sexual semiotics, read it from a Barthesian perspective. I felt spring stirring in my groin. Am I coming on too strong? Mesmerised and bewitched by that fresh painting on my mind, by the oil’s resinous and intoxicating scent on the cream-coloured canvas, I followed you like a fool, down Rodney Street, turned right at the post office down Bold Street then turned away into Pilgrim Street, as you asked me, rather foolishly, I now think: ‘Have you been walking just to have some fresh air?’ Now, Helen, you know why I walked, keeping up the elliptic conversation, thinking of your clever intellect and the ripe mango hidden somewhere between your thighs waiting to be squeezed and tongued by my sunlight. Some day, Helen, if you are lucky, you will see my tiger tiger burning brightly into Troy and you will giggle with joy. Helen, Not of Troy was first published in Sentinel Poetry Quarterly. October 2004 #2. Available to
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Esiaba
Irobi – a poet, playwright, actor and scholar was born in
the Republic of Biafra on October 1, 1960, and lived in in
exile in Nigeria, Britain, United States and Germany where
he passed away on May 3, 2010. He studied at the
Universities of Nigeria, Sheffield and Leeds, and held a
B.A. in English/Drama, M.A. Comparative Literature, M.A.
Film/Theatre, and PhD in Theatre Studies. In 1992 his play,
Cemetery Road won the prestigious World Drama Trust Award.
His books include Nwokedi, The Colour of Rusting Gold,
Cotyledons, Hangmen Also Die, and Why I don’t Like Philip
Larkin and Other Poems. He leaves behind a wife, Uloaku and
a son, Nnamdi.