If I could drum, I’d run deep into the forest and play. I’d start slowly, beckoning the ears of townspeople, inviting their subconscious to dance with me; to dance to the rhythm the forest exudes. I’d play faster, increasing the intensity of my sound, strike after strike, it would grow louder. When the surface of the drum is moist with sweat dripping from my face I will strike it even harder, I will strike it to my death. The metallic tang of the African drum will crackle and bite like village fires where tradition is passed down. I will beat the drum like an angry July rain descending on a cluster of zinc roofed houses with immense fury; I will not play music, I will play pain, misery, and death. I will beat the drum until the blood from my heart rushes straight to my palms and flood the surface of the drum, muzzling the sound of my beat, then I’ll beat the drum even harder. I’ll beat it till the sorry animal whose skin was borrowed to craft the instrument shrieks in anguish. That ought to keep the townspeople awake.

By Sidikie Bayoh

Sidikie Bayoh is a Sierra Leonean poet, and gardening and woodwork enthusiast who currently resides in Accra, Ghana. Follow him on Twitter: @dikie_moe Instagram: @dikie.moe