PROSTITUTE!

pros·ti·tute:

noun 

1. A person, typically a woman, who engages in sexual activity for payment

2. A person who misuses their talents or who sacrifices their self-respect for the sake of personal or financial gain

verb

1. Offer (someone, typically a woman) for sexual activity in exchange for payment

2. Put (oneself or one's talents) to an unworthy or corrupt use or purpose for the sake of personal or financial gain.

A woman, or other person, who performs sexual activity for payment; A woman, or other person, who is perceived as engaging in sexual activity with many people; A person who does, or offers to do, an activity for money, despite personal dislike or dishonour; To perform sexual activity for money; ...

en.wiktionary.org/wiki/prostitute

Also known as Hooker, Street Walker, Whore, Escort Call Girl, Puta, Trollop, Hindi:Vaisha, Urdu:Fahisha, Punjabi:Kanjri, Arabic: Momis, Polish: ROSTYTUTKA, Spanish: Prostituta, German: Prostituierte, Italian: Prostitute, Russian: Prostituka; French: Portuguesetuée, Portugese: Prostituta; Greek; Prostitut and Nigerian: Ashewo.

From Su Xiaoxiao, Chinese courtesan of 5th century to Polly Adler, New York Madam in the 1920s -1940s to Domenica Niehoff (picture below), Germany's most famous scarlet woman who died in 2009, prostitutes have existed from time immemorial.

Image Source

It is not for nothing that the trade is called the oldest profession in the world. Despite the (obviously) morally reprehensible nature of prostitution, some prostitutes have played some memorable roles in the course of history. Prostitutes have cut short political careers. Think Eliot Spitzer. Prostitutes have destroyed homes and families. Prostitutes have drained savings.

But Prostitutes have also done incredible good. They have saved cities. Changed the course of history. Think Rahab and others x-rayed in this interesting post about whores who changed the course of history.

They come in different sexes. Male Prostitutes exist as well as other forms whose gender classification may border on the ambiguous. Cough* Cough*.

They also have different orientations. Their location and locale is as diverse as can be. Prostitutes not only stand on the streets. They exist in homes. They reside even in the corridors of powers.

Many conditions and factors inform and fuel prostitution. The trade or is it art? has inspired a lot of songs from musicians ranging from Donna Summer's Bad Girls to Wyclef Jean's Sweetest Girl a very lovely song written in the context of immigration and sexual exploitation.

Sweetest Girl is a song I love so much, so why don't we just pause and listen to the official video featuring Akon, Lil Wayne & Niia.

In today's poem, the persona addresses the 'Ashewo' or Prostitute in a tone that is both reverent and irreverent at the same time. The narrative seems to be so discerning of the prostitutes mindset and the conditions that fuel her trade. The persona acknowledges the immorality of the situation but seems to haplessly cave in to his fate and that of the Ashewo as 'Night's invariable knock must come again'. The persona is both understanding and judgmental. The persona manages to approbate and reprobate at the same time.

The poem ends in a way that somewhat mirrors Wyclef et al's chorus in Sweetest Girl (You can find the full lyrics of the song here) when they sing: 

"Cos' I'ma tell you like you told me

    Cash rules everything around me..."

Cash really does rule everything in the prostitute's world and in concurrence the persona concludes in today's poem in the last two verses by saying:

"then unrepentant, gain supreme

wax recrudescent again."

Enjoy the poem and don't forget to listen to The Flight of the Conchords beautiful message in their music video after the poem. 

Ciao!

PROSTITUTE
Ashewo!
Nocturnal offspring of undulating miscegenation.
Stand with your lurid amour;
boldly proclaim your wares!
impervious to discreet night’s sarcastic whisper.

Ashewo!
Fermented vixen of alabastic Croesus
Declare my treasure! Hyenas gather.
Show Leviathan breasts!
furious confinement like Mississippi’s levee,
inundation threatened, at the snap of a string.
Lie recusant. Gleam betrayed. Desperate.
Yesteryear etched in oculur crevices like the
prenatal lines of a calloused palm.

Ashewo!
Intrepid reconnaissance of mismatched arrow and heart.
Reveal prurient wound purulent!
intent to pullulate scrumptious geese freckled
by oleaginous stains of ill-fated cravings.

Ashewo!
Waterloo of miscounseled youth.
Besmirch of my dark longings
and become barren of pride.
Return wasted! to recondite existence.
Adorn nonchalant humanity’s garb!
Wait! Night's invariable knock must come again
then unrepentant, gain supreme,
wax recrudescent again.

Uche Okorie. 4th March, 2002.