The Trapezoidal Drum

by Vusi Moloi

The Ndengese people of the Congo possess a unique drum, referred to by observers a a trapezoidal drum, because of it's shape.  This drum is a mathematical artifact of this region which has contributed various mathematical forms, including prime numbers embodied in the now celebrated artifact   Ishango Bone currently held at the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences in Brussels, Belgium.  In the author's scholarly paper, the "The Golden Rays of the African Sun" published in the anthology of essays and short stories The Heart of Our Community, the author elaborates further about the history of mathematics and the contributions made by the African continent, including Calculus.

From A Goodbye To My Little Troubles by Vusi Moloi © Canada

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The Trapezoidal Drum

To salute Ndengese's trapezium

To adore the trapezoidal drum

The convergence of parallelism

The convergence of divergent lines

To craft a drumming trapezium

To usher a triumvirate phenomenon

Volumetric sounds of the trapezium

Thunderous like the heaven's symposium

To praise ancestors via a trapezium

To praise them via a trapezoidal drum

To recall genesis via scattered lines

To converge them via  the shrines

To diverge towards convergence

To diverge away from convergence

Disproportionate lines of parallelism

The asymmetrical beauty of trapezium

To conceal their origin in the structure

To conceal indomitable claws like a vulture

Great trapezoid Ndengese's legend

Mathematically aware Ndengese's descendant