Thursday, 20 August 2015

Glory Days by Bai T. Moore

Glory Days

wandered in the moonlit night
to view the glory of the past

The ruins of those pioneer days
were silhouetted against the light

where once stood mansions decked with pride
now ruled by vipers and the bats

are ‘nough to make one stop and sigh

The broken frames can hardly stand
the beating of the constant rain

And on the landscape high above
the ruins of the parish too

can tell the ghostly story plain
beneath the grass stand epitaphs

a remnant of some burial ground

A lordly cricket once in a while
will break the silence with a sound

Or in some distant woods a drum
a native feast in feverish swing

I wonder after all these years
these ancient ruins can rise again

and brighten up a dismal scene?

Bai T. Moore

Bai T. Moore was born on October 12, 1910 in the town of Dimeh, a Gola village between Monrovia and Tubmanburg in Liberia, and died in Monrovia on Jan. 10, 1988. He studied at Virginia Union University and returned to Liberia in 1941, where he served the Liberian government in various posts while writing, promoting the Gola, Dey culture and the general cultures of Liberia. Bai T. Moore became Minister of Cultural Affairs and Tourism under the government of Samuel K. Doe, a post that he served in diligently until he died in 1988 at the age of 79.

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