Baje

He was very tall though slightly bent

In his eighties I would put his age,

A handsome man he must have been

Judging by the remnants at this stage.

He walked with the aid of a cane

I suspect it was more as a precaution,

The fact it barely touched the ground

Totally held my attention.

I heard he’d already made the century

That was really hard to believe,

I heard he’d met the Governor General

From whom a visit he had also received.

How long past the century I could not tell

But at that age he looked exceedingly well,

He was full of verve with an appealing wit

And an infectious laughter it was hard to quell.

Bald on top buy grey at the temples

An encyclopedia of knowledge was he,

Especially as it pertained to Barbados

Its development and early history.

Back to the early sixteen hundreds

When this country became a colony

He told of the many plantation owners

Whose gains were made through slavery.

He told of his very own ancestors

Whom he traced right back to that time,

 Of his fore-parents: one white and one black

A beautiful black girl the Massa did find.

Such that clearly from his complexion

One could still see the evidence

That he was a mulatto of such origins

The egg of a black girl and a Massa’s intent.

He appeared proud of his origin

The fact he was both Negro and Caucasian,

He could speak at length about either

Which he did on every occasion.

He was proud to be a bajan

Perhaps the reason they called him baje,

He knew so much about this country

The called him the national sage.

They say he never went to university

And didn’t have a single certificate,

Seventh standard was his highest education

But about Barbados he could educate.

University historians had nothing on him

He was Barbados epitomized,

And don’t try to put this country down

For a rasping tongue would materialize.

He spoke of Samuel Jackman Prescod

And of Bussa the freedom fighting slave,

He spoke of Charles Duncan O’Neal

One of the heroes on our money engraved.

He highlighted the abolition of slavery

And the challenge it posed for the slaves,

How the Massa made them work for little

And called them good for nothing knaves.

“Not all Massas were bad,” he said

“A few of them were really good

Their slaves were really granted their freedom

And treated like a human being should.”

He talked much about adult suffrage

How the blacks were given power to vote,

How they had a say in the running of the country

He thought this was of the highest note.

He spoke like the erudite professor

He elaborated on the minutest details,

A panoramic view of Barbadian history

And the various challenges we assailed.

He gave a lengthy discourse on 1937

He talked about Adams and Clement Payne

He spoke of the event as an eyewitness

And the resulting developmental change.

He came right through to Independence

At which his eyes brightly lit up,

“Barbados had come to age,” he said,

“No longer was she Britain’s colonial pup.”

She had won the fight for self-rule

The right to determine her trading partners,

The right to set up her charter and direction

Without having to assent to what Britain preferred.

He spoke of the significance of the Barbados flag

Its three panels and the broken trident,

He recited the words of the national anthem

As he recounted that first Independence event.

Then a brisk walk through fifty-one years

Of successes and failures, falls and spills,

Of politics, elections and change of Governments

Of economic recessions, development and thrills.

From Barrow to Adams to Barrow again

St. John in between before Sandiford would reign,

Arthur took over then in came Thompson

Presently there is Stuart seven years holding strain.

Seamless takeovers with little or no fuss

This is the Barbados heritage in which we trust,

Quite a lot of talk during an election campaign

But as the electorate we do what we must.

Finally baje would chat about the outlook

Regarding the next ten to fifty years or so,

“We could do a lot better,” he would always say

“But we must make the effort to put our best on show.”

“We have come a long way,” in reflecting, he’d say

With that far away look in his eye,

“And with God’s help we will always get by.”

And with that he would look towards the sky.

Stewart Russell © November 2017