Echoes of trauma, social consciousness in Elizabeth Akinsehinwa’s ‘In His Care’

By Paul Liam

THE renowned African poet and scholar, Niyi Osundare, in his meta-poem, ‘Poetry Is,’ highlights what many critics and scholars have described as the sage’s conceptualization of the social function of poetry. They argue that Osundare presupposes that poetry should not only be accessible to ordinary people but should be able to inspire in them the courage they may not otherwise realize they possess. In this light, therefore, poetry is conceived not as a preserve of a few elites but as a tool for societal regeneration through enlightenment. This proletariat-inclined notion of poetry is premised against the background of the sociomarxist problematization of the class struggle for means of production and economic equality between the elites and the masses. Thus, Osundare, in ‘Poetry Is,’ posits that poetry is: “Not the exoteric whisper/of an excluding tongue/Not a clap trap/for a wondering audience/Not a learned quiz/entombed in Grecoroman lore.” The poem further reads: “Poetry is/A lifespring/which gathers timbre/the more throats it plucks/harbinger of action/the more minds it stirs.” The poem concludes by asserting: “Poetry is/No oracles kernel/Sole philosopher’s stone/Poetry is/Man/Meaning/To/Man.”

The allusion to Osundare’s poem above underscores the premise of this analysis which seeks to examine the representation of trauma and social consciousness in Elizabeth Akinsehinwa’s debut poetry collection, In His Care, which in Osundare’s style responses to the social conditions that undermine the development of the girlchild and women and boys in the larger society. Akinsehinwa is a new poet whose talent reveals a deep level of social consciousness and artistic depth characteristic of a sage, with several years of experience, although she is a debutant. Her messages are lacerating and psychologically engulfing even as she expresses herself in accessible language. Her ability to construct and convey the tragedy of abuse, trauma, and sociocultural practices that undermine the development of the girl-child is instructive. Akinsehinwa’s narrative power is evocative and indictive; it provokes and questions society’s role in the abuse and victimization of young girls who endure lifelong psychological trauma occasioned by the action and inaction of elders, those whose moral duty is to protect them from harm. How Akinsehinwa poetically reimagines the role of society in fostering the dehumanization and silencing of abused young girls in society is telling of the remarkable power of poetry to document and to examine how societies functions and responds to the development of vulnerable children including boys and girls and in general to the overall wellbeing of those at the margins of society. It is based on the foregoing premise that I shall now attempt a brief analysis of Akinsehinwa’s debut poetry volume, In His Care (Tebeba Global Publishing, Lagos; 2025), a 58-page collection.

In His Care is a collection of 37 poems written in prose and narrative styles. It chronicles the agonizing travails of a dominant female persona that has suffered various forms of violations, including sexual abuse and family neglect, she prevails with a determined resolve to live above her trauma and societal castigation. The collection reinforces the notion of poetry as a means of storytelling. Not many people realise that poetry beyond the aesthetics of language tells profound stories, stories of courage, rage, and survival. For Akinsehinwa, she chose to share the story of a young girl with a strong will to overcome societal neglect and abuse she suffered at the hands of close family friends and even among family. The poems call us to reflect on the important duty of looking after and protecting the innocence of girls and boys in a vicious society and a perverted society peopled by disastrous men and women alike. The protection of the innocence of children is not a matter of choice but a matter of duty. Children should and must be protected at all times by their parents and society. The absence of protection exposes them to all sorts of harms and injustice, especially from close family allies who take advantage of their innocence.

We are introduced to the tragic account of the poetic persona in the poem titled “Hello Uncle”, in which a victim of rape recounts her gory experience at the hands of a supposed ‘uncle’ who is regarded as a close family friend and whom she calls uncle but who turns out to be her nightmare. The poem begins on a casual note like a letter addressed to a loved one. The opening stanza introduces us to the feigned relations that often exist between victims and abusers. Often, children in their innocence trust their parents’ acceptance of relatives or friends into the family as friends, and the children are bound by good morals to regard them as family, even though they often are not family members. It is through this familial connection that the abusers often take advantage of the innocent children. The first three stanzas of the poem corroborate this assertion:

Hey, trusted one,
Unrelated by blood,
Yet you earned the title of “uncle” in my home.

Unarmed, they thought you were,
‘Cause your presence lit up the room,
But no one knew how fast you turned off those lights,
Once it was just you and me.

I had inherited the trust,
Accepted the gifts without a thought,
Not knowing they were meant to appease the gods,
For biting from forbidden fruit.

While the initial three stanzas introduce the dynamics of the relations that lead to the abuse of innocent children, subsequent stanzas of the poem provide more intricate insights into the nature of the abuse and the ensuing trauma and blackmail that the victim is forced to live with. But as we read through the poem, the persona reveals the intricacies of the deceits and wonders if her abuser reflects on his atrocities. We get this inclination in the last stanza of the poem in which the persona poses a rhetorical question to her abuser, whether he suffers from the same trauma she suffers from abusing her:

Hello, Uncle.
Do you ever have flashbacks, or is it all blank?
Or is it just me playing the part of a wounded child?

Akinsehinwa, through this poem, highlights the psychological disturbances suffered by a victim of sexual abuse who continues to relive the traumatic experiences she went through at the hands of a so-called uncle who was meant to be her protector. This is the fate of many young girls who go through life reliving past hurts inflicted on their innocence by close relatives or family friends, unable to find true healing. Here is a wounded woman wondering if her abuser is haunted by the pain he caused her, as she is of his betrayal of her and her family’s trust. In the poem titled “Shush Boy”, the persona tells the story of a boy who has seemingly been abused by an older woman, and like the girl-child, he is expected to be a man and outgrow his abuse. But the persona reminds us that even boy children are not safe or exempt from abuse. The threat of silence meted out on the girl child is the same as that of the boy child, as reiterated in the poem. The helplessness of the victim is succinctly conveyed in the last stanza of the poem: “Our eyes caught for a second,/And she muttered, “You are a man now.”/How do I live knowing I let the silence win?/Does that make me a man? Victims of abuse live with unimaginable trauma for the rest of their lives while their abusers go about living without consequences.

In the poem, “Atinuke,” the persona affirms her existence and declares her resolve to live above her challenges and society’s undermining of her agency. She is determined to rewrite her story and create an impact even though the world is unwilling to give her a chance. She is bold and willing to thrive where others have failed. This position is reinforced in the last stanza of the poem:

This Atinúkẹ carries a spirit that endures,
Where others gave up.
She will rewrite the tale they tried to bury,
Reclaim her name and be renamed.
Ẹdá tí a pè ní ìbùkún, kì í jẹ kíkùn lójú ayé.
(A soul named blessing will not live as a burden.)

Society often puts a lot of pressure on the girlchild and often dismisses her importance or contributions to society, but Atinuke is a different breed of woman who is aware and unrelenting in registering her presence in the world. She tells us this at the beginning of the poem in the second stanza where she notes: “Atinúkẹ—a name woven with love,/Born to be cherished and adorned, /Only into a twisted world,/That ripped her true essence,/Exchanged her worth for lies she couldn’t question”.

In the poem, “Mummy Did You Know,” the persona raises salient questions about the ignorance of mothers about the conditions of their children, especially daughters, and what they go through. The persona, using rhetorical questions, wonders if the mother knows the pains and trauma she lives with and the abuse she has passed through. Often, modern mothers are caught up in the struggle for bread, leaving their children in the care of predatory relations or family friends who abuse them. While the mothers provide the material needs of the family, the children, especially daughters, live in neglect without the emotional support and care necessary for their development. Thus, in the poem, the persona reveals her mother’s innocence and ignorance of her pain and abuse; she doesn’t blame her but draws her attention to the gaps in their relations. She praises her mother’s resilience and commitment to meet their material needs.

The poem reads like a letter from a troubled daughter to her mother, revealing her trauma and worries. In the first stanza, the persona acknowledges her mother’s sacrifice thus: “Selfless and courageous,/Strength of a thousand men,/Your maternal instincts always come correct./But did you know that you could only try?” After acknowledging her mother, she goes into the details of her treatise. She submits in stanza three thus: “But did you know about the marks unseen,/And the pains concealed,/With wounds only revealed/In whispered words behind closed doors?” After narrating her fears and all she has endured in secret, in the last stanza, the persona makes a pledge to be present in her daughter’s life, to be her friend, and to be all that her struggling mother could be for her. She declares: “And I will daily rise, because of you,/For in your strength,/I’ll find my own strength,/Of becoming a mum that knows her child.” The poem is a telling portrayal of the consequences of parental absence in a child’s life and the struggles they end up dealing with. The poem also appears to create the impression that her mother is a single mum overwhelmed with life’s struggles, hence the daughter’s continuous acknowledgment of her sacrifices throughout the poem. It is a sad, sorrowful poem that evokes pity for the narrator and her mother are both victims of the reality of life.

In “Tanwa,” the persona highlights the struggles of being a girlchild in a traditional African family setting where preference is given to the male child. Societal discrimination against the girlchild remains a major social challenge in traditional African families. Tanwa’s birth was heralded by high hopes by her father, who looked forward to having a male child, but she turned out to be a female child, and right at the news of her birth, her father registered his disappointment as though she were is disease that had come to destroy the family. The poem offers an illustrative representation of the dilemma of female children in Africa. This assertion is accentuated by the stanza of the poem explaining this parochial belief that male children are more important than female children and are considered perpetuators of the legacies of the family. The persona opines: “It is custom here/That the birth of daughters before a son/Is a reminder of lost legacies and crown passed on./A bitter dose of a father’s regret,/For birth right is lost without a bowl of stew exchanged.” Consequently, the girlchild is born a trauma, a disappointment to her household in which she has to live like a stranger. She assertion is corroborated by the fourth stanza of the poem which reads: “So from isolation to guilt-tripping,/She found a connection to let go/Of the resentment that surrounded her birth.” However, the persona leaves a strong message to society by positing in the last stanza of the poem, thus: “But whose fault is it?/That she is born a girl.” Indeed, whose fault is it that she was born a girl?

In conclusion, this analysis has attempted to highlight Akinsehinwa’s acute sense of poetic representation of trauma and social consciousness as shown in her ability to use poetry as a powerful tool of conscientizing the society on the sufferings of women, children, and sexual abuse victims who endure a lifetime of psychological and physical displacement. In line with Osudare’s pontification of the social responsibility of poetry and its accessibility to the ordinary people, Akinsehinwa offers us a refreshing rendition of the human conditions of the vulnerable members of society that are often hidden in flowery dresses, makeup, and feigned smiles in accessible language that can be understood by any literate person. Her sense of poeticity comes alive in many of the poems. Although some readers might find her work a bit prosaic and didactic. But, above all, it is a fine expression of grief, trauma, and resilience of the girlchild in a hostile society.

* Liam is a writer, culture critic, strategic and communication specialist based in Abuja