DID SHAKESPEARE SMOKE POT?
…it was one of those nights writers might be much used to…you looked forward to putting down a few reasonable words…you also hoped to follow that up with the harder task of checking language,grammar,spellings and punctuations…you remembered how many times you told students to pay attention to content,organization, expression and mechanical accuracy…in naija that’s what tutors call COEM..the almighty COEM!…LIKE ITS COUNTERPART IN MATHEMATICS…you know you want to publish what you write on the net…so it had to be something a bit reasonable…not freshly pressed yeye standards but just saying what you have in mind……so you got behind the lappy,switched it on then everything went haywire!…firstly your lappy was slow booting up…secondly when your desktop showed up you remembered that there were certain unfinished matters to be dealt with before going into some thing new…”Christ!”,you muttered!…”Why now?”…suddenly you had the feeling the night was not going to go well…so, were you to go back to bed or what?…but out of the corner of your eyes you saw the music file on your desktop and said to yourself…”thank God, its not going to be bad after all”…you clicked on the file and ordered WINAMP to play on…it did,but your body was not just cooperating…the music failed to hit your bone as it used to …you tried jazz,afro-jazz,juju,hip hop,nigeriana and only one seems to impress your brain a bit…the track of …”I’m A Nigerian Boy/Port Harcourt Son” by Duncan Mighty…so you clicked on “repeat” in Winamp and it goes on and on like forever!…
…next you checked your files for some inspiration…something new on WAEC/NECO English Language out of so many you still wanted to publish…since you knew some of them might need to be polished or slightly amended your brain sent a message to itself…”can you?…can you make the script slightly better and more relevant before pushing it out?…but the signal you got back was bad news!…it told you that even though you might be willing the body was weak!…then you asked your body…”was it lack of rest during sleep or too short a time?”…but the body answers you with a mighty yawn!..”.Christ!” you muttered to yourself again…”Why the yawn?”…as u started thinking of going back to bed the image of a butterscotch mint loomed up and its prophecy was a promise of relief and first-aid for what you wanted…just to write a few reasonable words!…the scotch fast-tracked into the mouth and the effect was immediate…nice!…then you took another … and another!…you then switched back to the job at hand but it was then the brain suggested you add Orbit Chewing gum to keep your mouth alive without a yawn while working…oh yeah,good idea.. you reached into the container and took out two pieces and started grinding…somehow you won the battle over the body but another part of you…the mind is not just there!…”What is all these for God’s sake?…why are things not working tonight as they used to?” you mumbled…suddenly it occurred to you that since you had two tins you named “SWEET AND SOUR”,why not dip your hands into the sour tin which contains coffee and bitter kola?…but then another decision had to be made…only one could be chosen for the night and not two to four like the sweets…so which one was it going to be?…which one was going to raise the mind,connect it to your spirit and have your engine running again?…
…as you were about to dip your hands into the bitters the idea rushed through…yet again… that you should play scrabble against the computer instead …having beaten your computer many times you thought that would bring some joy…so you played the first one and got a good hiding by the computer…back to square one!…may be it was anger combined with a low spirit that drove or paddled your hand so fast to the coffee…good old Nescafe, full-blooded (not decaffeinated) type!…you mixed it with extremely cold water,no sugar and no milk…you downed it and you waited… surprise,surprise…you didn’t have to wait for too long…minutes after it got to your stomach the messengers took the info to your brain and your nerves shot up like plants sprouting in a field…your body was playing music and your mind and spirit were dancing what we call kokoma in naija!…yes,you were alive again and ready to go through hundred files…you brought out only twenty, put them down beside you for further dissection…but as you sat down the thought came up…was it like this for Shakespeare?…could he have been taking coffee or smoking cannabis to be that good?…of course everyone knows that many musicians play good music by making use of sterner stuff than coffee…not so?…
…i am writing this right now because all you’ve just read happened to me about two hours ago!…i am writing because since the day i was called “Shakespeare” by classmates in school it never occurred to me…no, not even for a day to ask if Shakespeare could have been smoking pot to be that good…so to the net i turned and the question to Yahoo and Google got stated as follows “WAS SHAKESPEARE A DRUG USER?”..when the answers came back i was shocked to discover that my inquiry had been on a controversial burner for over a decade!…but every discussion, every effort,every proposal to exhume his body had been rebuffed by The Anglican Church of England and his followers…one of the reason they gave is the epitaph on Shakespeare’s grave which says
“Good frend for Jesus sake forebeare,/ To digg the dust encloased heare;/ Bleste be the man that spares thes stones,/ And curst be he that moves my bones.”
…this write-up is a result
of the burst of energy from caffeine…this might be the situation with
many authors and writers…so those reasonable words…and those iambic
pentameters…that lucid prose … might have been sourced when one “is
truly in the spirit”…thanks for reading this…for the patience…and back
to my files i go…what a night!…
...i know Ruka and Vic will again
laugh on reading this on their system as they did reading the “many
miles to go” post…actually i am laughing at myself too…but please have a
nice day both ‘ya…see you later…
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