Preface (መቅድም)

         
I am Andinet Demisie (Andu Mela). I was born in Gaynet and raised in Debretabor. Debretabor is the capital city of Emperor Tewodros and Gaynet is the land of fearless warriors. I consider myself as a born poet. Nothing catches my attention like the beauty and vibe of words. And nothing concerns me like spending a night with out reciting a poem from my favorite poetry collection.

I sometimes dare and ask myself what is a poet ? and is it my true vocation ?. I soon came up with a bold answer that it is matter of life for me. I know a true poet is a king and a master of this world in a true sense. When I was a 12 years boy I was attending an Ethiopian Orthodox priesthood education called Abenet (Kolo temari). There I met a well known Gonder Debtera (like a black Magician) and the Debtera gave me Abesho (a traditional medicine that believed to make a student smart).

    Since that day I have lost myself. Now after many years I reflect back and I found out that my sickness came from that Abesho medicine the Debtera gave me. Because When I was living in America in exile for 10 years I became a Bi-polar patient. I suffered from a mental disorder sickness for the last 10 years. I have been in more than 10 psychiatry centers and hospitals including the well known Amanuel mental specialized hospital in Addis Abeba Ethiopia.  I am in a long healing process and my health is hopefully improving after a long hard straggle with help of my loving family.

    However the Abesho Medicine I took when I was a 12 years boy helped me in a positive ways too. It ignited my poetry gift and makes me a true poet in many ways. I am now living with a spirit that came from that Abesho medicine and of-course the medical doctors called this spirit the voice. They considered it as a sickness that need to be treated. But for me the spirit is like a friend and companion that guides me in a everyday life. It is a Daemon like phenomena. It inspires me to write good poems and mysterious verses. And I can say it makes me a Genius of some sort.  Yes, it is working ...
 
    As I write my introduction like this I look for the hidden message in the words. That hidden message is nothing but the poet in me. It is to live a life of a poet and to write poetry in blood period. Even when I was in America as an immigrant with different culture and language, I didn't hesitate to study theater and poetry at the University there. Because I know that it is my true call ... I see the poet as messenger of God. Like the prophets the poet delivers his messages in chosen words as the Oracle of the Greeks and as the ancient faith of Ethiopians.

    My blog http://meyesawian.blogspot.com/ and My Facebook Page are  Masterpiece works of mine. As an Actor and a poet they represent my whole work as a religious and an artistic platform. My Meyesawian blog reminds me the Stoa paint of Lyceum in Greek and the great British poet John Milton put it in his work in a marvelous way. In paradise regained book four John Milton shows how a poet or an Artist become a King. Yes a poet can be a King Complete in his masterpiece work merits through a course of time. Here is a historical testimony of John Milton work for you.    

"Great Alexander to subdue the world,                                           
Lyceum there, and painted Stoa next:
There thou shalt hear and learn the secret power
Of harmony in tones and numbers hit
By voice or hand, and various-measur'd verse,
Æolian charms and Dorian Lyric Odes,
And his who gave them breath, but higher sung,
Blind Melesigenes, thence Homer call'd,
Whose Poem Phœbus challeng'd for his own.
Thence what the lofty grave Tragœdians taught
In Chorus or Iambic, teachers best
Of moral prudence, with delight receiv'd
In brief sententious precepts, while they treat
Of fate, and chance, and change in human life;
High actions, and high passions best describing:
Thence to the famous Orators repair,
Those antient, whose resistless eloquence
Wielded at will that fierce Democratie,
Shook the Arsenal and fulmin'd over Greece,
To Macedon, and Artaxerxes Throne;
To sage Philosophy next lend thine ear,
From Heaven descended to the low-rooft house
Of Socrates, see there his Tenement,
Whom well inspir'd the Oracle pronounc'd
Wisest of men; from whose mouth issu'd forth
Mellifluous streams that water'd all the schools
Of Academics old and new, with those
Sirnam'd Peripatetics, and the Sect
Epicurean, and the Stoic severe;
These here revolve, or, as thou lik'st, at home,
Till time mature thee to a Kingdom's waight;
These rules will render thee a King compleat
Within thy self, much more with Empire joyn'd."

    In the American great poet Ralph waldo Emerson essay entitled "the poet" we can again be sure that the poet is a king or an Emperor in his own right. When I was reading this essay in American book stores I remember how delighted and energized I became. My faith in the poet grew up and it became rooted in my own Ethiopian way of self expression and Identity.

     I said to myself I swear I would become like a born poet bold and passionate.That is exactly what I kept in my heart to this day. Here is a quote from Ralph waldo Emerson Essay "the Poet" , see the depth of the poet and his potential heights as a king or as an Emperor in his own right. He writes "The poet is the sayer, the namer, and represents beauty. He is a sovereign, and stands on the center. For the world is not painted, or adorned, but is from the beginning beautiful; and God has not made some beautiful things, but Beauty is the creator of the universe. Therefore the poet is not any permissive potentate, but is emperor in his own right. Criticism is infested with a cant of materialism, which assumes that manual skill and activity is the first merit of all men, and disparages such as say and do not, overlooking the fact, that some men, namely, poets, are natural sayers, sent into the world to the end of expression, and confounds them with those whose province is action, but who quit it to imitate the sayers. But Homer’s words are as costly and admirable to Homer, as Agamemnon’s victories are to Agamemnon. The poet does not wait for the hero or the sage, but, as they act and think primarily, so he writes primarily what will and must be spoken, reckoning the others, though primaries also, yet, in respect to him, secondaries and servants; as sitters or models in the studio of a painter, or as assistants who bring building materials to an architect."

 It is all about being a poet ... becoming a poet ... a born poet. And the kingdom is at hand.

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