Now I will chant a salute to my Ogun
O Belligerent One, you are not cruel.
The Ejemu, foremost chief of Iwonran Town,
He who smartly accoutres himself and goes to the fight
A butterfly chances upon a civet-cat's excrement and flies high up into the air.
Ogun, don't fight against me.
Don't play with me.
Just be to me a giver of good luck.
You said you were playing with a child.
I saw much blood flowing from the girl's private parts.
Ogun, don't fight against me.
Don't play with me.
You said you were playing with a boy.
I saw much blood flowing from the boy's private parts.
Ogun, don't fight against me. Don't play with me.
You were playing with a pigeon.
The pigeon's head was torn from its neck
Ogun, don't fight against me.
Don't play with me.
You were playing with a sheep.
The sheep was slaughtered with a knife.
Ogun, don't fight against me.
Don't play with me.
You were playing with a male dog.
The male dog was beheaded.
Ogun, don't fight against me.
Don't play with me.
O Belligerent One, you are not cruel.
The Ejemu, foremost chief of Iwonran Town,
He who smartly accoutres himself and goes to the fight.
A butterfly chances upon a civet-cat's excrement and flies high
up into the air.
There were initially sixteen chiefs.
In the town called Ilagbede, of these the paramount chief was Ejitola,
Ejitola Ireni, son of Ogun,
The blacksmith who, as he speaks, lightly strikes his hammer upon his anvil repeatedly.
Son of He who smashes up an iron implement and forges it
afresh into new form.
Son of He who dances, as if to the emele drum music, while holding the hollow bamboo poles used for blowing air upon the coal embers fire in his smithy. He who swells out like a toad as he operates the smithy's bellows.
I will chant a salute to my Ogun.
O Belligerent One, you are gentle, the Ejemu, foremost chief of Iwonran, He who smartly accoutres himself and goes to the fight. Some people said Ogun was a failure as a hunter.
Ogun therefore killed a man and packed the corpse into a domestic fire.
Then he killed the man's wife and packed her corpse behind the fireplace.
When some people still said that Ogun was a failure as a hunter,
The sword which Ogun was holding in his hand,
He stuck into the ground on a river bank.
The sword became a plant, the plant now called "labelabe".
Hence the saying "No ceremony in honour of Ogun can be performed at the river-side,
Without Labelabe's getting to know of it".
It is I, a son of Akinwamde, who am performing.
I do good turns for people of decent appearance.
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