The Chiefs, the Elders and the Soul of the Village

The Chiefs, the Elders, and the Soul of the Village

Today I gather my cup of tea, as I do,

and I sit in my chair,

but before the thoughts come rushing in,

I look out the window.

It is rainin soft, steady, and sure.

The kind of rain that cleanses not only the earth,

but the spirit too.

I can hear each droplet,

see it tapping the leaves,

and I breathe in this beauty.

All is well with my soul.

And as the rain falls,

my thoughts travel to the sacred hills and dusty paths of Africa,

to the heartbeat of the village,

to the ones who sit in council—

the chiefs,

the elders,

the wisdom keepers.

In Africa, the chief is not simply a figurehead.

He is the living embodiment of lineage,

the echo of generations.

His authority is not self-made it is inherited from the ancestors,

bestowed through ceremony,

sustained by the trust of the people.

He carries the weight of history in his bones.

He wears the stories of the land in his robe.

When he speaks,

he does so with the voices of those who came before him a thousand ancestors leaning in,

guiding his words,

guarding his silence.

And then there are the elders—

women and men,

their backs slightly bent from labor,

but their eyes sharp with vision.

They are the memory of the village.

They remember who your grandmother was.

They remember the day you were born.

They remember the names of the rivers

before they were called something else.

The elders sit not at the edges,

but at the center of the community.

They are the ones called upon

to bless a newborn,

to settle a dispute,

to name a child,

to pray before the harvest.

Their wisdom is not fast.

It does not shout.

It waits.

It listens.

It remembers.

The chief and the elders

are the balance keepers between past and future,

between tradition and change,

between justice and mercy.

And oh, how Africa reveres them.

Their chairs are carved with respect.

Their titles spoken with hush.

Their presence invoked

whenever something of worth is about to begin.

I sip my tea now,

and it feels fuller somehow as if it carries the echoes of the elders’ voices,

the slow strength of the chiefs’ deliberations.

And I wonder:

What would it look like

if we in the West honored age as Africa does?

If we sought the counsel of those who’ve lived long and loved deeply?

If we asked before acting,

listened before speaking,

bowed before building?

Rain still falls.

And my soul feels steady,

just like the village does

when the elders are near

and the chief walks his rounds—

knowing not only his people,

but his place among them.

So today, I honor them.

The chiefs in their kente and crowns,

the elders with their stories and songs,

the ones who hold the village in the palms of their hands

and the wisdom of Africa in their hearts.

To them, I raise my cup.