The entry of 2022 came with a lot of relief and excitement if the whole enthusiasm isn’t about change of numbers. A lot has gone wrong in 2021 as well as a lot of things to smile about. It has an interesting dynamics, characterized by ups and downs, which experts of the monthly zodiac, would’ve classified as part of the life profile.
The ups and downs, coincidentally, happen within a certain trail categorised by these sophisticated people as part of the make up of the life profile of the individual born within a specific time frame.
If the year 2020 seemed, for better or worse, to mark the start of a new era—one heralded by a global pandemic and a widespread civil-rights protest movement—2021 perhaps felt characterized more by frustration, bringing neither the “return to normal” that many hoped would come with a covid vaccine nor the kind of radical social restructuring for which the moment might have been ripe.
Instead, the pandemic continues—wave after wave, variant upon variant—as political and environmental crises grow only more dire, producing the uncanny sense of both stasis and dread. This hasbeen depicted by many scholars in their writings and speeches. One of such speech was the 2021 new year speech delivered by the President of Ghana which highlighted near doom and hope. It comes at the backdrop of an election characterized by violence, declarations greeted with demonstration, and resolutions clouded in animosity. Such was an entry to 2021.
However, the young American poet, Amanda Gorman’s electrifying poem on the inauguration of 46th President, Joe Biden exemplifies the power of poetry to navigate between truth and artifice, observation and speculation, the momentary and the momentous—to grapple with the liminal, the ambiguous, the contradictory. The poetry that was published in 2021 attests to the overwhelming sorrow, fury, and strangeness of our time, and locates small yet significant instances of genuine mercy, beauty, wonder, and possibility into the future.
These poems bear the weight of the loss and the trauma, incurred in recent years and inherited across generations, but as they mourn they also marvel at the multifarious, improbable experience of being alive, urging us to attend to both what is and what could be; the economic hardships peering, the social bonds punctured; and mechanical breakages in the joints of human health.
This intrinsic anomalous breakout of pandemics and epidemics which has taken the world by surprise has equally triggered the busy genetics of the Zodiac professionals to categorize these happening along the Zodiac lines. Whether these can be successfully or not, the world has galloped past another mild year, albeit frustration, anticipation and hope as compared to the 2020 which was totally clouded by dark clouds, loneliness and subjectivity.
2022 promises nothing of extraordinarily yeoman but a process of gradual recovery and healing. This, like a stroke patient, who anticipate that by the close of the next day, his return to normalcy would’ve been concluded and life to it fullest. But then pass a day, another day, and another day; runs into weeks, months, and years before the reality hit the crown. They realises, it will take them decades to actual get closer to normalcy. Years may come, years may go, the pandemic has pinched an indelible scar on the world which may take a long time to heal-thus if it will ever heal.
We have wrestled with this demon and stained with its marks and no shame. Neither are we guilty of its appearance. Our responsibility is neither the ordinary, nor the timely. It does not include our kith, or kin. It does not extend to the lost gene, or the flower in the pot. Not the loins either. Its loyalty is to the inner vision, whenever and howsoever it may arrive.
2022 says in the hideout, “if I have a meeting with you at 12 midnight, rejoice if I am late. Rejoice even more if I do not arrive at all. Now here I am, full of promise and recovery, healing and success. But do not forget the suprises too. This is me, my name is 2022.”
There is no other way artistic works can worth their while than in painting situation of this nature. And the occasional success, to the striver or/and the writer, is worth everything. However, the most regretful people on earth are those who felt the call to creative work, who felt their own creative power restive and uprising, and gave to it neither power nor time. Life, every second, minute, hour and day is worthwhile in the ensuing year.
Together, lets welcome 2022 with a mixture of reflections. Lets be more socially appreciable in this year, tolerance should exercise to its max while patience with one another should be our very fabric of society as we navigate through this recovery process.
Written by;
Al-Latif Kambo-Naa