Man And His Symbols

The fight ended in a bitter scuffle, a most unpleasant turn of events that forced Onyi’s father into a speech. It was not common for the priest-guide to speak. Not directly to the people, anyway. As he rose from the throne he sat on, even the drunkest fell quiet, eyes all around sharpening with focus.
‘It is a shameful thing that we have seen here today, my eyes water with pain.’
The crowd made a noise like a sad wail, and some groaning could be heard. A few breaths passed and it was quiet again.
‘We have known from the Great Ape Men that when you throw your opponent to the ground, you are to leave him be and rise immediately, as the point is already won.’ He turned to catch the eyes that watched, and when his gaze hovered over the area where his daughter stood next to Anyi, the boy wished he was made of clay, or better yet, of air. ‘It is a great taunt to,’ the priest-guide continued, ‘…to wrestle a man to the floor and then to put sand in his mouth. It is dirty, alu!’
Lips bent to frowns and murmurs floated about. In Anyi’s mind, the moment flashed again.
The bigger man had kept a grudge from the first round, and the sting of his defeat was hard to hide. Anyi saw it in his eyes, a wicked bitterness. Onyi saw it, too.
‘Ahh! It looks like this one wants to kill him, or at least really hurt him,’ she had exclaimed.
The body artists did their best to paint the wrestlers so they looked fierce. Wrapped in nothing but small loin covers, the wrestlers’ whole bodies were canvases for the artists to do as they wished. Animal themes were common, the tiger being the most popular for obvious reasons. The bigger man wore a body marked with symbols belonging to Ekwensu – fire, metal, coins, and an uneven measuring scale among other things. His face was painted red with the blood of a sacrificial goat. Ekwensu, the spirit of war and maker of deals, was never to be consulted by children. The man licked his lips and wagged his tongue, his rage laced with madness. The smaller man had seen the change; he could not have missed it. No one watching could have. But his initial victory filled him with confidence. This was a mountain he could move. After all, he had already moved it once, toppled it even.
What followed was a thrashing. The bigger man leaned into his weight with anger and bloodlust. Wherever he grabbed his opponent, his fingers dug in to spill red. The grappling scuffle did not last very long. The smaller man soon lost his footing after being swayed left and right under the crashing weight of what Anyi imagined must have felt like struggling with an elephant. He slipped on his back heel, and the heavier wrestler followed him down. The two hit the ground, the weight of one man on the other.
‘Onye ala,’ were the words mouthed by the bigger man before he packed a fistful of clay and forced it into his opponent’s mouth. This was when the priest-guide shot out of his seat, and all the men standing nearby rushed into the circular ring to restore sanity. This was why the priest-guide was tearing up.
‘How can one who knows not the taste of defeat wish to know the taste of victory? Can you know night without day or bitter without sweet?’
The offending wrestler now stood with his head hanging low as the words of admonition continued to rain.
‘I would have asked you to come to my obi later, but no, you may not do the evil in the open and wash your hands in secret.’ The priest-guide looked around again and this time, Anyi caught the white paint over his right eye and noted how similar it was to Nneala’s from the cave. Perhaps it was a special symbol among great spellers, a sign of an all-seeing eye.
‘Do we rape the wives of our enemies and say it is a spoil of war? Do we take blades to the throats of children while their fathers watch?’
‘Mnba nu, no!’ Voices spoke up and the snapping of fingers made to the ground could be heard, a gesture that spoke of abomination.
‘Wrestler, you have offended your neighbour, your tribe, and the spirits. But we, your tribe, forgive you. Because though soiled, you are still a fruit on our tree. Your sin, though deep, did not cut to the root of who we are. So, we forgive you.’
‘Ise!’ The crowd chorused – a chant of agreement most commonly used after the declaration of blessings, before the breaking of kola or the drinking of liberated wine.
‘As for the spirits,’ the crowd quieted for the priest-guide to continue, ‘…you should know that a sin against them is really a sin against yourself, against your chi. You must study the teachings of the ancients, so that you may drink of their knowledge and purge the poison that has corrupted you. The poison of pride, hate, and violence.’
‘Ise….’ the crowd chorused again.
‘Lastly, as for the sin against your neighbour which is the greatest of the three, because neither the spirits nor tribe can feel pain or shame, ’ the people repeatedly nodded along to the speech like agama lizards, as if a single nod would not be enough to convey their agreement, ‘…to your brother’s obi, you must take three kola nuts and a barrel of fresh palm wine. You will kneel before him, and you will offer him this. You may not rise until he accepts. And if he doesn’t… ’ the crowd was still silent, ‘At least you have held ofor for him and your heart is clean. It is now only in his heart that the pain lives. It is not roped to you anymore.’
‘Ise!’ The crowd rose to its loudest.
With that, the fighting was over and the music resumed. People gathered in small groups and chatted in clusters, and soon enough, the old began to retire to their obis for the night. Anyi and his friends found a story cluster and sat by the fire to listen. It was an old woman doing the telling; Nne-isi, the blind library who housed so many stories. Tonight, she told one about Ada’m, a popular favourite.

And so, in the beginning, it was very different. The Great Ape Men did not speak in the way that we do now. Though they had tongues and could sing songs, it is written that most of their words were unspoken. With the power of their divine minds, and in direct contact with Amadioha, they could communicate in thought and across vast distances, through dreams, spirit whispers, and chi travel. They could speak to the earth, and it would quake if they asked it to. They could ask tides to calm, rain to hold, and it is rumoured, even ask the sun to sleep.

The children murmured among themselves.

Ada’m, the first blue, did not fall because he ate of some fruit to pull a scale from his eyes. The Great Ape Men had long known good from evil – the mind of Amadioha is all-knowing. And they knew that mind directly, drinking from its wisdom in sleep and in wake. Ada’m fell because he peeled his eyes from the ground and faced them to the sky. He chose his own will over the will of Amadioha. He gazed upon what Amadioha had made and called it ugly, covering it in shame. He looked to the teeth of wild beasts and saw fear and horror. The same beasts the Ape Men rode and commanded with speech. Ada’m decided that perhaps, there was a way that was better than the way of Amadioha. And so, he betrayed his tribe from the root, earning him the casting out along with all who believed in his truth.

‘But what if he was right? Do we have a choice to be made free or not made at all? Or is it our destiny to be mere tools in the hands of Amadioha?’ Anyi wished he had not asked the question as soon he heard it escape his mouth. But he had, and it was too late. Perhaps it was his chi that pushed him, perhaps he just wanted to know. The blind old woman turned towards his corner, but her eyes floated without focus.

You do not have to ask for answers you can see for yourself. I am very fortunate to have gone blind. The sight of this world makes me want to weep. Possibly, I wept my way into blindness. The world today is dominated by the mind of Ada’m, the mind that ended the Age of Legends. It began when Afaraka started to believe that what we received from Amadioha was truly ours, our own thoughts and creations. When even the ground became property, taxable. When gold became more than just a thing that shines. Amadioha cannot force a people or person into his ways. But you must know – there is only destruction once you stray from the path. A mother may warn her child about the fire of the oil lamp, but it is the child’s choice to heed or disregard. Amadioha has no need for you – he who thought uwa into existence. Do not become like Ada’m who thinks too much of himself. It is you who has all the need for Amadioha.

They listened to the rest of the story without interruption, and when it reached its climax at the great flood that ended the Uga Awun, they began to shuffle back to their homes in small friendship groups.
‘Anyi, what you asked about our will, and Amadioha’s will,’ Onyi started.
‘Leave him, he just wanted to say something,’ Tobe cut in.
‘Tobe, you are a useless friend.’ Anyi responded.
Onyi did not speak any more until the other boys had dropped off at their parents’ obis.
‘Anyi, I was going to say… what you said about our will and Amadioha’s will, be very careful. That is the spell that broke the world and is still breaking it. Do not be tempted by Anya.’
It was that word again, Anya.
‘This Anya you keep going on about. Are you going to tell me what it means according to spellers?’
She smiled a little.
‘When you get home, ask your father. He will tell you.’
Now they were in front of Onyi’s obi, a large cluster spotting more buildings than Anyi could count. A place worthy of a king, a place no one man could keep forever.
Onyi stood under the moon, its light shimmering across her forehead and glinting in her large eyes.
‘If my eyes ever turn blue, Onyi. I want you to promise me that you will remind me of how I am.’
The request was abrupt, almost too direct for a people who preferred to speak in circles.
‘Anyi!’ Onyi motioned a circle over his head and clicked her fingers to the ground ‘Tufia! I reject it!’
‘I…’
‘I will hear no such talk from you again. Never! Do you know that words are spells? That at their mere utterance, they can find anchor and become permanent?’
Anyi wanted to tell her about the things he had heard from Nneala in the cave and the dreams his father had reported. But he said no more. As it was, her face had folded in sorrow, and her voice sounded like it had broken with tears. Perhaps her father had seen what was coming, and she already knew too. Or maybe it wasn’t through her father’s eyes, maybe it was through hers. After all, she did claim to possess ama for agwu visions.
‘Onyi, leave that boy and come here now now!’ a woman’s voice called from inside.
She smiled at him. He smiled back, and then she scurried off to meet her mother.
Anyi continued on his walk home alone, waving and bowing at the men who still sat outside drinking from their horns and cups. Eventually, he was home. From the fires, he could tell which huts were occupied and which were vacant. Through a window, a silhouette could be seen of a woman getting her hair braided. He knew from the bean-like shape of both heads that they belonged to the first wife and her daughter.
‘If you like, keep hanging about with Onyi. The day her father asks me to bring goats and strong wine, I will take it from your inheritance,’ his father’s voice caught him from behind.
’Nnanyi, she is just my friend. We are not going to marry.’
‘That is exactly what I said about my first wife, and my second, and then your mother. It is from clapping that the dance begins, from humming that the singing starts.’
‘Hmm, me I don’t know oh!’ Anyi shrugged his shoulders and wondered why his face felt hot. His father took a swig from his drinking horn.
‘Anyi’m, afurum gi na anya.’
He had wanted to leave, but that word rooted him to where he stood – Anya. Again.
‘Nnanyi, Onyi says that Anya is a word with great spell meaning. I tried to find out from her what it meant, but she would not tell me. Will you?’
The older man sighed.
‘What do you understand by ifunanya?’ he asked the boy.
‘To see with eyes. To love,’ Anyi replied.
‘What a man sees and loves may kill or save him. The wise choose well what to attract and what to repel. You see, love is the strongest of all the spells, and the Ape Men believed the eyes to be the main window through which it climbs into our spirit.’
Anyi furrowed his brow to meditate on the word. He thought of all the things he loved – beautiful sculptures, the view of the obis from afar with their colourful patterns, the sight of the heavens when the stars came out to shine, and Onyi’s face, ebony with large brown eyes that reflected the moon.
‘Be careful with your eyes for there is much that they see, and much that they do not. For all the lamp that is the moon, behind it lies a darkness no night can ever match in blackness.’
‘But Nnanyi, how is any of this magic? Is it not just wisdom? To be careful of the eyes and its deceit. I thought it would be more.’
‘You are still too young to understand. They say the Ape Men turned water to stone and lead to gold with their powers of transmutation and their secret knowledge of alchemy. We call it magic today, but they probably called it wisdom. For the freedom to see as we please, and the beauty of being seen as we are, fully and with love, even the weakest can find strength to pick up a sword. If it is magic to turn water to stone or lead to gold, tell me, what is it to turn the weak to the warrior?’
‘So, when you say that you love me in our Eke tongue, you mean to say that you see me completely?’
‘I mean to say that I see you as I see myself, without separation. We are stuck as one, like the joining of the lids when we blink. When your eyes are closed, do you see any separation between you and the world?’
Anyi said nothing.