The Climate has changed, the Globe is warm, Afforestation answers it all: An Interpretation of Pamela Ajayi’s “A Plea”
By: Zakiyyah Dzukogi
A Plea by Pamela Ajayi is a poem whose theme is complexly concealed in the dangers of deforestation – man murders trees at will. Trees are mothers in the forest, their demise is the demise of the Eco system and life. Here, nature is personified as a beautiful lady in agony of survival.
The poem shows a once densely vegetation overtaken by modernity. The poet’s melancholic nostalgia rubbishes the artificial trees: skyscrapers poking at the sky, in cities. This sadness always come to the personae at night because in the night, nature appears more beautiful. Very true for many reasons: rest, peace, meditation and as a canopy against heat. Vegetation is health, with a sea nearby it becomes perfect. This is the ignorance of man.
It talks about how nature, a living system, laments her defilement by man to become “an eyesore”. “My sides ragged, overflowing with debris”: plastics, polythene bags, cans, industrial wastes etc, which congest and degrade her freshness. Man does this to himself in the townships: rape, kidnapping, murder and looting, why not to the forest. Never-the-less nature, in her innocence, wonders who could salvage her and stop the “grinding cycle of destruction” on her.
The end of the poem pleads to man for a return to her originality and beauty. Tragically, the plea is to the law breaker. It is unlikely that he will take heed except with a Global Action imbued with punitive measures, including capital punishment because deforestation is an Action of Mass Destruction (AMD). Forest and trees produce a vital element for the preservation of life – oxygen. The Global Action must be expedient! The climate has changed, the globe is warm but afforestation answers it all.
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Zakiyyah Dzukogi is a member of the Hill-Top Creative Arts Foundation. Her first work is a book of verses published when she was 10 years old (My Book of Poems). Her recent poetry collection is titled CARVED. It won the 2nd position in the maiden edition of Nigeria Prize for Teen Authors, 2020. Also, she was the winner of the December 2019 edition of Splendors of Dawn Poetry Contest. She has her works published in The Nigeria Review, INNSAEI journal, konyashamrumi.
