In Search Of the Lost Tongue

They journeyed back to the past
Digging deep into archives vast
Day and night they laboured on
Unearthing bones from ancient tombs
In search of the lost tongue

The mother tongue of Urhobo
The rope that bound the people as one
Lost in the rubble of Ughelli
Buried under the wreckage of the colonial masters

In this ultimate search
to recover this precious artifact
And to reclaim their native charm
What they found has putrefied

Foul pidgin flying out from the whole
from the mouth of their offsprings
English Pidgin, full of vile expressions,
flowery metaphors and slang
But with no poetic feathers to grace
Adulterated their true mother tongue
The tongue with which elders conjured words divine
Has lost its power in translation