The Milennium Park Poem by Tony Adah

The milennium park
Stands tall in the
City of Calabar
It is beautiful
As gold and silver
White and green
Brown and blue
As quintessence of
A cosmopolitan place
All in the bush.

Its edges are hedged
By pines of needle leaves made
And masquerades
In their drooping branches and leaves
Saluting the broad leaf ornamentals
Swaying in the wind

It must have been
The handiwork of
A geometrician in
Its rectangular form
The south West end
Tappers towards a fountain
In its silvery spray
That cools the federal reserve branch

Behind the eleven eleven roundabout
As it is sometimes called
Is a tall brick wall of the prison
The british built
Here now stands a prison for books

There's a flagpole
In the middle of the park
On it the green white green
Whispering in the wind
So tall a nation's pride!

Its base of marble cast
Replete with mummies astride
Bearing the history
Of this great slave port.

A black submachine gun
Mounts a platform
And rumbles only in silence
As the fountain gets the muzzle
That targets without action.

Of all these
The milennium park gets
Attention only once a year
When there is a clarion
Call to remember the old soldiers


On this day the bugle blares
And the city rises in accord
To pay respect to soldiers
Here they wear medals on their chest
Feathers and tassels in their caps
All showing Praise for gallantry
For those who defend the world
And their country in their chosen trade
Always in this park.