Not My Business, By Niyi Osundare
How does the poet use imagery and structure to develop his ideas?
.Obviously, the poet used repetition as each of the last three lines of the three starting stanzas / verses repeat and say the same thing:
"What business of mine is it
So long the do not take the yam
From my savouring mouth?"
So, what does it mean? These three lines have a deep meaning which is also the whole message of the poem. What it means is that it is telling the reader that if you do not care, or stand up for others (which requires bravery as it is not easy...), those bad things are going to happen to you and no one will stand up for you, just like you did. We can see that this message is carried out very well as it is being repeated in every verse apart from the last one, because the bad thing now happens to him and there is no one which cares about it and does something. In the first stanza he is saying he doesn't care that someone got "beaten up" as it is not his business. On the second one, he says he doesn't care that someone got dragged out of his own house at night. And finally, on the third one, he said he doesn't care that someone lost her job for no reason. So, as a final thought, I think that this really developed all his ideas.
"What business of mine is it
So long the do not take the yam
From my savouring mouth?"
So, what does it mean? These three lines have a deep meaning which is also the whole message of the poem. What it means is that it is telling the reader that if you do not care, or stand up for others (which requires bravery as it is not easy...), those bad things are going to happen to you and no one will stand up for you, just like you did. We can see that this message is carried out very well as it is being repeated in every verse apart from the last one, because the bad thing now happens to him and there is no one which cares about it and does something. In the first stanza he is saying he doesn't care that someone got "beaten up" as it is not his business. On the second one, he says he doesn't care that someone got dragged out of his own house at night. And finally, on the third one, he said he doesn't care that someone lost her job for no reason. So, as a final thought, I think that this really developed all his ideas.
By Adamo Mariani