Opening Cycle and Point of Entry

With permission to enter the homestead, the poetess's imagination grows wings

Words trip over her tongue, impatient for the moment of utterance

Hyperbole seizes the license to decorate plain words with extra lacy language

Now only the feet drag with the weight of age as dancer after dancer enters as if claiming territorial ownership of space: as if swearing to eclipse all competition

First Cycle (one score): Entry into the Dance Arena

Wũi wakwa-ĩ! (Oh my!) I, dancer/singer that used to be!

Where shall I find the feet to enter this competition-bound dance arena

where younger, more nimble dancers are sworn to make a shadowy fool of me

stomping the yielding ground that readily surrenders to their aggressive youthful energy?

Oh, who will lend me youthful feet to enter the arena, I, dancer/singer that used to be,

to celebrate my age-mate, the son of Thiong'o, on this his eightieth birthday?

Of a truth, ancient proverbial wisdom did not lie: wainaga nĩeroragĩra!

(Sh/e who once danced/sang can turn into a spectator)!

But, refusing to turn into a spectator, I dancer/singer that used to be, vow to call upon the spirit of rebellion to possess every inch of my body.