IN THE ABSENCE OF VISION!

IN THE ABSENCE OF VISION!

IN THE ABSENCE OF VISION!

The earth starts to vomit skeletons long buried,
Once swallowed by time,
As politics become a means to amass wealth
You can buy a vote at thirty pieces of silver,
You don’t need any ideology, patriotism, narrow nationalism
Or any of these fancy human rights’ slogans
Once bandied about by the politicians.

Politicians become mafias belonging to rival gangs
Characterized by hate, women and wealth
Stolen from and through state institutions’ into private pockets,
Reasons! Frozen under the rule of terror.

In the absence of vision
Factories close down
As engineers and professors sell airtime by the corner tuck shop
Farmers struggle to find markets
For maize, soya, and sunflower once bought by the Grain Marketing Board
Whose allocation line reads zero on national budget.

Civilized robbery blooms!
In the form of uniformed police
Using a self-imposed law of spot fines
Collecting cash! I mean ‘cash’ every day
To a bank account no member of parliament cares to know.

In the absence of vision
There is no culture!
Humanity and values died a complicated pregnancy
Fathers become animals ejaculating on sons, daughters, and day-old babies
Like wild dogs in a wasteland.

In the absence of vision!
Abject poverty digs deeper into bone marrow like the scars of HIV
Quasi-state-companies mushroom
As diamonds disappear to the Far East unprocessed
With payments made to individual Swiss accounts.
In the absence of vision        
Desperate soul seekers get ambushed
By Pentecostal thieves in the name of miracles
As self-made prophets Prosper,
On earth as it should have been in heaven.

Somebody is looking for someone to preside over them
As thousands of apostolic churches occupy every open space,
Older women and girls in white dukus sit
On the ground under multi-coloured flags.
Listening to grey-bearded men
Dressed in snow white gowns
Who will soon sleep with them all.
The priest molest the destitute
As he shows them the way to righteousness.

In the absence of vision!
Land becomes a weapon for cohesion
To keep the peasant in line
Assisted by war veterans, most of them born after 1980
As real veterans languish in poverty,
Long used and thrown away
Like condoms only useful in time of need.

In the absence of vision!
People become scared of nothing but their own Creation
And when it gets dark they whisper to the wind
Wishing thokoloshis could run for Mayoral Elections.

In the absence of vision!
Hope remains suspended.