Author: John Akerele
Reviewer: Sheriff Oshin
Publisher: Greenlife Publishers UK
Pagination: 77
John Akerele, a trained Quantity Surveyor, construction management expert, and member of the Irish Literary Society has a strong passion for girl-child-related issues and women in general. In his debut work on rape and sexual abuses theme, he derived his book title, Blood on the Dance Floor. A newly published collection of 40 poems by Ireland-based poet and author, John narrates the struggles and different forms of abuse against the girl child and women in an emotionally touching way.
The book’s content outlines the prologue – an insight into the women’s world, revealing their misery and grieves, struggles, and pain depicted in an emotional lamentation of a broken girl who woke up with a hangover to discover she has been sexually violated, raped and dumped by a man she met at a party the night before; her body hurting, her dress torn, her private parts bruised and unable to remember anything beyond chatting, laughing and having a drink with the scoundrel who violated her.
With a saddened heart, her disappointment is narrated thus: “The event is over. The pain is not over. The cloth has been washed, but the blood is still here. I am on the dancefloor of life. I cannot dance anymore. He has stolen my joy. All I see is blood on the dancefloor.”
In the poem, A tool of his Ideology, John condemns the custom & practice of giving an underage girl-child’s hand in marriage under the pretense of religion or belief.
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“At a time she should be full of dreams/When her youth holds so many possibilities/She already belongs to a man/Her tender frame already learning to please a man her father’s age!”
In the poem “Teach your Boys”, the poet emphasized the importance of respecting women and understanding consent. John stated that “A woman’s body should never be objectified, a woman’s body is not a canvas and a woman’s worth isn’t based on her looks”.
Blood on the Dance Floor is undisputedly a product of John’s childhood experiences in Kaduna where he was born. He lived in a place where the girl child was not accorded the same opportunity as the male child. John is an activist and avowed advocate on girl-child-related issues. Blood on the Dance Floor, his debut poetry collection, has confirmed him as a poet of great promise and potential.
It is a must-read for everyone, irrespective of their gender.
Get Blood on the Dance Floor, and let us know what you think about it in the comment section.
You can also follow John Akerele on Twitter to get frequent updates on his poems.
