Songs in Times of War (Poems) by Nol Alembong

Publisher’s Preface

There are moments in the life of a people when silence becomes unbearable. When homes are emptied, classrooms abandoned, families separated, villages transformed by violence, and ordinary lives interrupted by the machinery of conflict, literature acquires a responsibility beyond aesthetic expression. It must remember. It must witness. Above all, it must insist that behind every statistic, every political claim, every uniform, every border and every battlefield, there remains a human being whose life matters. Nol Alembong’s Songs in Times of War is one of such works.

This collection is a powerful poetics on war and its consequences, but it is not a celebration of war, violence, military glory, or political triumph. Instead, it turns the gaze away from the abstractions through which wars are often discussed and towards the people who endure them. The collection’s most compelling characteristics is its refusal to reduce war to a contest between winners and losers. Alembong repeatedly redirects the readers’ attention to those beneath the great movements of history. Their voices, fears, memories, and hopes constitute the human chorus from which these poems emerge.

The poems give voice to soldiers and civilians, mothers and widows, children and elders, refugees and exiles. Through an array of richly textured imagery drawn from African landscapes, oral traditions, and proverbial wisdom, Alembong explores themes of loss, displacement, memory, resilience, and hope. In his poetic vision, the baobab, the drum, the council fire, the ancestral earth, and the village path become enduring symbols of community, continuity, and survival. The elder becomes a voice of caution; the drum becomes a carrier of communal memory; the forest becomes a repository of wisdom; and the animal fable becomes a way of examining human conduct. These proverbial and traditional elements function as instruments of reflection.

Similarly, throughout the collection, the natural world functions as both a witness and a victim. The earth receives blood and bodies; fields are burned; rivers become contaminated by violence; and trees stand over scenes of human suffering. The baobab, the iroko, the savannah, the river and the soil become repositories of memory. The poet seems to be intent on conveying the idea that nature does not forget simply because human beings move on.

Amidst the grief and destruction, these poems also affirm the enduring strength of the human spirit and the possibility of renewal. Alembong’s achievement in this collection lies in his ability to bring together the multiple functions of poetry without reducing the poems to political sloganeering. The poems speak through narrative, metaphor, proverb, lament, dialogue, symbolism and reflection. Their world is populated by warriors and widows, children and elders, refugees and farmers, soldiers and mothers. The result is a broad human panorama in which war is seen not from a single vantage point but through many eyes.

As publishers, we are honoured to present Songs in Times of War to readers. We do so with the conviction that poetry remains one of humanity’s most enduring instruments for remembering what violence seeks to erase. These poems mourn the dead, speak for the vulnerable, question the logic of violence, preserve cultural memory and imagine the possibility of renewal.

Imprimatur

Professor Labang

Publisher