The ManicaPost
Morris Mtisi
HE wears his formal hat like his lifeline. He looks very simple and shy but behind that quiet ordinariness hides a stubborn and brave writer with an insatiable appetite for ChiNdau, a dialect of Shona spoken around Chimanimani but more typically
in Chipinge.
His name is Ishmail Chemusinainyorekureya Penyai.
The second name is suspicious by its sheer length and means quite a mouthful. It means ‘What you don’t own or have is easy to mention.’ Literally a sentence, but a name!
In an interview with this reporter on his HEAD-TO-HEAD WITH MM Diamond FM Radio programme recently, the Ndau speaker and writer elucidated the meaning of his long second name.
“It’s easy to say, I want to become the best in everything, or I want to want to own this and that and then be this and that in the speaker’s wildest of imagination,” said Mr Penyai.
Mr Chemusina…has published three books written in fabulous Ndau. The following is an excerpt from his first, ‘‘NHEKWE DZIRI KANYI’’, a compilation of poems in which he exhibits “words, accents, tones and nuggets of ethnic expression currently alienated by Shona Language Committee’s obsession with the so-called ‘Standard Shona,’ writes Musaemura Bonus Zimunya-University of Zimbabwe’s seniour lecturer-English Dept.
Mwamunewo ngewangu
Mwamuna weunodakara naye uyo
NGEWANGU!
Mwamuna unokutwara ngemovha
Kwende kumushando nekupetuka
NGEWANGU!
Mangwanani nemadeikoni uri mumotokari
Unoti ndiri bofu kayi inini?
Unoti andowoni ndiri bofu inini?
Mweitorana koorye zvinonaka
Unoti ndiri mburunzee andizwi?
Unoti ndiri mburunzee andizwi inini?.
Inini ndeirye sadza nenhanzva
Ngwarira ndichakunanzvawo..
Ndeitakatire manjoko neana angu,
Ngwarira ndichakunjokora
Ndeisheye sadza ngemunyu zuwa ngezuwa
Ngerimweni zuwa ndichakusheya ngechibhakera.
Ndeirye sadza nenhungumira
Iwewe weitungamire kuhotera
Zvichaa negore mukorokondyo ukafe dziso.
Muisawo unokuaraidza
NGEWANGU!
Mwamuna unofemurike echifemere iwewe
NGEWANGU!
Ndati siyana nemwamuna wangu,
Ndati siyana nemuisa wangu
Ndisati ndakuise chitsinga……
Nyatorekera ndapota rekera
Ndumure yakatsonge kudaro
Hautsveruki ngeyi kudaro
(continues)
In NHEKWE DZIRI KANYI in the words of Musaemura Zimunya, “We experience the beauty of poetry in words we thought were dead and realize that we owe it to ourselves as a nation to keep, to protect and revive the great gift of language inherited from our forefathers…..”
I had the honour and privilege to be with Penyai on HEAD-TO-HEAD WITH MM on Diamond FM Radio a few weeks ago.
The Ndau poet has a huge appetite for the dialect. The nation indeed owes Penyai as indeed it owes Christopher ‘Mtape’ Siduna and Zuweni of Diamond FM, credit for reminding us that Ndau is not just a crazy dialect but a live vernacular language, like any other, capable of depicting every aspect of life: courtship, romance, celebration and laughter, death and misery, in church guiding Christians to God, politics and even radio and television broadcasting.
Penyai has also published SCARLET MEMORIES a compilation of English Poetry.
I talked about his courage, his ‘stubbornness’ and itching tenacity.
“Soon his third book,” says Chemusinainyorekureya, “TSURA NGOKO- will be released.
My dream is that one day the students going to school in Ndau-speaking Chimanimani and Chipinge will sit examinations in which Ndau set books are options.
This will be the day they will be liberated from using other not-so-familiar vernacular dialects.” And why not!
And why not indeed! These are the new authors the times are searching for. Well done musharuka! Muromo aunyimi muna wawo.
Mawakatobeka pona apapo ndizvo zvemene! Washeya ngegwiza warye nyama peya-azviedzani ngewasheya ngegusha. Rambai mweinyora musharuka.
Payakasunungurwa nyika nesuwo takasunhurika peya. Apana chitiyo chinotetere chinhani. Musasatetere sure inga huku-teterayi mberi wedina woye -zveshe ngazvienderere mberi ingamukekeyi Jah Prayzah wokukekeya echiemba.
