A Defiled Manhood

by Sunday Abel

A man who defiles his manhood commits an unpardonable offence, but denying the misuse challenges the wit and sacredness of the deities of the land, the inviolable adjudicator.

Desmond gripped the scaly legs of the hen. Both he and his accuser hand-carried their birds as was the procedure for such an occasion. The Akpu-abada deity wouldn’t accept a cock, for cocks lacked resilience.

Desmond’s eyes rose and settled on the crown of the Anunube tree. In Igbo land, the Anunube was the incarnation of the gods. Everything said about the ageless tree was true, its long-standing dreadfulness and tranquility. They said it was as old as the village and as mysterious as a lake.

Most of the shrines in Igbo land had this type of tree. It towered over the others, sinewy in its ferociousness, unshapely, gigantic, and intimidating. Any bird that perched on its branches died quietly on the spot. No human came close and survived the night, except on the chief priest’s instruction and consent.

It was said that the gods took refuge in the Anunube. No tree grew near it; any that came in contact with it, withered outright. It was as fearsome as it was reputable for its usefulness. The tree healed all manners of ailments if consumed according to the priest’s prescription. Juju was made from the tree to enchant people, a talisman for protection and good luck as it housed the deity.

To utter a lie before Akpu-abada was to choose to die an undignified death, to permit oneself to be thrown like an Ebola victim down the steep of Akpu-abada Mountain without a tearful farewell from loved ones. Whoever this deity killed, died unusually, without quaking, the body turned white within minutes of the last breath. This omen was the indication that the god was responsible for the victim’s demise.

Desmond accepted this fate. He would lie about misusing his manhood before the great Akpu-abada. In Imeoha, as well as surrounding villages, to misuse one’s manhood was rare and to misstate before Akpu-abada was suicidal. But not all who lied died, yet calamity came as certain as the rising and setting sun.

Once a woman, the seventh wife of a chief, grew dissatisfied with the once-a-week sex ration from her husband. She sought a younger man from a nearby village and kept their affair secret. The husband discovered it, and a case came before the ancestral adjudicator. The wife denied the affair before the deity, saying she never opened her legs for another man. Unsurprisingly, Akpu-abada killed her accuser’s hen, and she left disgracefully with hers alive.

Afterwards, everyone waited for her death in the few days following the conviction. She didn’t die. Instead, her life went wrong, becoming proverbial, always on the lips of the elders when morality lessons and speeches on fidelity were given to

the younger generation.

The woman’s life became miserable. She opened her legs for everyone. Men—young and old—climbed on top of her in private and public. Whoever wanted relief from their libido sought her out and found it. But those who did shared in her curse, dying before their time in unacceptable ways. Some slipped from palm trees, falling to their death. Others died on top of their wives, by the side of the road, or disgracefully with protruded bellies.

Desmond’s eyes fell upon the grotesque masque of the deity whose voice must be strictly followed. He doubted the masque could prove his guilt and was rather excited to see if any phenomenon might take place. Had he committed any other crime other than the one he was accused of, he wouldn’t have bothered to lie. But misusing his manhood was deemed heinous, even more so to have done it against a friend, the only one in Imeoha who understood his tongue. The one who told him the little he knew about the village and this deity.

Under Desmond’s feet lay the decaying variegated feathers belonging to those whom the deity acquitted of the wrongdoing. Once the accuser and accused presented their case, the deity killed the bird of the innocent. It usually died peacefully, not from strangling, slashing of the neck, or smashing. It died bloodlessly from the spoken words of the chief priest without any torrential quake in its last breath.

Desmond Afamuefuna arrived in the Imeoha village only a few weeks ago from Massachusetts, where his Nigerian parents naturalized. His father told him he was old enough to get to know the area of his roots. Desmond only understood the white man’s English, speaking through his nose as the villagers would say. He spoke in a “ya men, ya men” fashion that was unacceptable. A true son of the soil spoke the language of his ancestors; he followed the culture and traditions of his native land. Desmond planned to spend the summer achieving these things, but then he misused his manhood, causing him to appear before the dreaded Akpu-abada.

In Massachusetts, it was impossible to misuse one’s manhood. Everybody used their manhood however it pleased them. Once his college friend caught him staring at the sprouting hair around the shaft of his pelvis. Desmond was pleased with those hairs and took every opportunity to go into the toilet to see if they were still growing. That older friend caught him and taught him how to use his manhood in the way Desmond would later try in his ancestral home.

The accuser, Thomas, was a boy whose head attached to his body by a string of a neck that swung this way and that as he walked. Such a slender neck was not enough for the head but well suited for his pendulous legs. The collarbone rose from his shoulder blades and fell into his body on the lower base of his neck. His eyes were a dense black, and his countenance showed his feelings of betrayal.

Thomas’s name had been given to him when he joined a newly planted protestant church, the first of many in Imeoha. During his baptism, Thomas doubted if ordinary water was capable of washing away his many sins. When the priest told him that baptism was symbolic, Thomas pleaded that he be allowed to stay for days in the holy water where others had only been momentarily immersed. From that came about the name Thomas at the expense of his renounced Igbo name, Anyasi, meaning darkness.

Because of his new faith, he was forbidden to appear before Akpu-abada for litigation or to seek spiritual help from the deity. To do so was to acknowledge the supremacy of the god over his own. But Thomas wouldn’t allow a crime such as misusing one’s manhood to go unpunished. Doing so would result in his own death for not revealing the abominable offense.

He gazed at Desmond before returning his eyes to the chief priest who seemed ready to preside over the case.

The chief priest performed incantations in a tongue only understood between him and the deity, then he broke the kola nut and threw it against the terrifying masque. He poured libation on the ground for the sleeping ancestors to bear witness. Both the accused and accuser were given alligator pepper to clear their voices and purge their lips of evil, making them audible to the gods.

Desmond chewed his alligator pepper and swallowed with pride. Then he contemptuously pointed a fuck-you finger at his accuser, who grimaced as if to say you shall see.

Previous cases in Imeoha included allegations of a wife killing her husband; a man claiming possession of a late brother to the detriment of his widow and children; quarrels over land ownership or theft. There had never been a case of one misusing one’s manhood, and thus, the stage was set for the gods without precedence.

“Anyasi,” the chief priest called, peering at Thomas. He wouldn’t call him by his protestant name for only Igbo and the languages between the priest and deity were allowed. The chief priest frenetically shook his head, poised to speak the deity’s message

to the litigants.

“Hold this ofor.” He handed Thomas a woebegone stick with too many joints for its length.

“Speak nothing but the truth to Akpu-abada who already knows the truth.” He paused and peeked at the masque. The white feathers looped in a creaky white cloth fastened around the Anunube tree along with the blood-smeared cloth knitted with limpets, snail, and tortoise shells. Every space was occupied by calabashes of different sizes and skulls of various animals. An evil spirit seemed to hover over them; a haunting eeriness that gave the shrine its deserved frightfulness.

The chief priest was an old man who wore a thick copse of white hair surrounding the bald patch on his head. His face was decorated with native chalk, and a long gray beard and moustache curled over his mouth. He whistled and extolled the deity in the unknown language while Desmond appeared lost in the labyrinth charade of justice.

“To lie before Akpu-abada is to challenge a hungry lion to a fight, the beginning of the end of whoever does it. Nwata na agba egwu suru gede, omakwa na surugede bu egwu ndi nmou? Ukpana okpoko gburu, bu kwa nu nti chiri ya.”

The youths waited outside the shrine, punctuating the flow of the proceedings with boisterous singing. An exaltation overflowed from the spectators aggrieved that their land had been sullied by Desmond. Leaves, slabs, and stems rose and fell to commensurate the crime committed. The villagers awaited judgement.

The historic feats of Akpu-abada were still fresh in their hearts. The elders who stood among them jerked their fists and wagged their walking-sticks. The infuriated tore off their chieftain caps. Desmond’s offense could unleash the gods’ wrath against Imeoha. It could bring strange illnesses upon the people, cause locusts and beetles to devour the crops, or force the Avuna stream, the only source of water, to dry up. The land must be cleansed from Desmond’s abominable deed, so the elders came to prosecute him as well as determine how best to avert the impending wrath.

Thomas raised the offor to his mouth, gobbled down his collected spittle, and cleared his throat to speak.

“I have come not to seek justice for my own sake but for the sake of our land. I will speak nothing but the truth. Should I say an untrue thing before the great Akpu-abada, may my life go wrong.” He paused and eyed Desmond, who seemed unperturbed. “When he arrived in this village, my master Reverend Joseph told me to show him ‘round the village. Afterwards, we ate from the same plate and slept in the same bed, sometimes in his father’s house, sometimes in the priest’s. Yesterday, while we slept in his father’s house in the same bed in the middle of the night, he did that which is unspeakable.” Thomas stammered, glancing at Desmond and the chief priest who urged him to continue.

“I was jolted from sleep by a stick-like object, intruding into my anus. It was powerful and painful. I pushed away whatever it was from my body. On a closer look, it was him—Desmond with his stiff organ in his hands. That’s why we have appeared before you,” he concluded with a sigh of relief.

“Aru!” interjected the chief priest. The offor was handed to Desmond to state his defense.

Desmond arrogantly collected the rusty stick from Thomas but did so with his left hand. The chief priest rebuked him for being uncivil as it was forbidden for left hands to give or receive items within the vicinity of Akpu-abada. Even the left-handed used their right hands within the shrine, an unwritten code that Thomas had previously warned Desmond about, but Desmond sought to taunt the chief priest.

He returned the stick to Thomas, recollecting it with his right hand. Desmond raised the offor to his mouth, then brought it down. He glowered scornfully at the chief priest and returned the offor to his mouth and spoke, “Fuck! You! Fuck you, motherfucker.”

“Aru!” Thomas exclaimed, holding his hen tightly with his right hand, the other covering his mouth. The chief priest was oblivious.

Desmond stooped and then hastily straightened up. He twirled the hen in his hand while in a pirouette, much to the consternation of the onlookers. Desmond then struck the hen against the Anunube tree and bolted out of the shrine. The hen quaked and died.

Sunday Abel is a journalist and writer of Nigeria whose literary works have earned several prizes, including the Creator of Justice Literary Awards by the International Human Rights Art Festival Movement, New York. His riveting short story, "A Defiled Manhood," confronts the collision of an American-Nigerian with the culture of his parents’ homeland.

Abel is among the finalists of the Native Voices Award and is of the Igbo people group. The Igbo people are among the largest ethnic groups in Nigeria, primarily located in the southeastern part of the country. They have a rich cultural heritage and a diverse set of traditions that have been preserved over centuries.

The Igbo society is organized around the extended family, which includes not only parents and children but also grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and other relatives. The family is the primary social unit.

As illustrated in "A Defiled Manhood," traditional religious practices of the Igbo involve ancestral deities, masks, and ritual performances. In Abel's profound story, he discusses the authority of the Akpu-abada deity, which holds the power to impose justice within the community through supernatural powers.

Abel's character, Desmond, epitomizes the Western arrogance and disconnect from Igbo traditions. The story even alludes to the perverted violation of Western culture upon cultural beliefs.

The expression of parables and proverbs is greatly valued in Igbo communication, often used to convey cultural values. Throughout Abel's short story, he does a powerful job of recapturing the traditional values and beliefs of Igbo culture, showing its overall significance and power.