AFTER THE MAY \'98 RIOTS

AFTER THE MAY \'98 RIOTS

AFTER THE MAY \'98 RIOTS

Now there won’t be any need
to tell our children
about the history of the struggle
of our gallant people’s fight
to take back the land
from the foreign usurper.
Look around you –
It’s more or less the same:
the broken windows
the gaping doorways
the splintered glass
on the pavement
the stench of the smoking streets
and the scattered entrails
of the looted shops
floating in their own blood –
– all this.
All we have to do now
is just point a finger at all this
and tell them:
this, too, our gallant forbearers did
before they took to the bush
to deliver us from the corrupt and rotten rule
of a government that didn’t know equal rights.
It wasn’t wrong then,
and it wouldn’t be wrong now,
if only, if only now, these were not
our own brothers
if only, if only we did not share
the same painful memories:
the landmines we left
planted in the bush
one still smouldering, unearthed
sweet potatoes of yesteryear?
They are sprouting again
in the rightful fullness
of the turning season.