. . . and so
On that misty morning
After a night that thundered,
Smashing the darkness into
Myriads of cosmic fires;
As raindrops hung limpid
From drooping branches
Like tears on war-weary faces;

That awesome Easter tide morn
As dawn broke
Like a blood-soaked veil
In the east;
The terrible mist
That forever hung heavy on the land
Began to lift.

In the infant light
Of the light dying mist
Their faces
Began to form.

Strange faces.
Yet loved faces we knew;
Faces like
Half-forgotten legends.

Slowly
The young light
Carved their strange forms
Out of the darkness dying.

And as the mist
Like a dying spirit
Faded from the glades
They came down from the mountain
Bearing arms on their shoulders
And palm branches in their hands;
The symbol
Of the new order.

Though of human measure
Yet more than mortals
They seemed
Blood and bone of the womb
But steel in resolve

And one thus did speak:
“Put back the suckling to the breast
And the beast to the harness.
Till the land
And reap the bounty
Of your motherland.
The ravaging monster
Is vanquished,
And lo behold,
Yonder rises the morning star
And high on the roof top
The rooster greets the day”

But before the mist
Was swallowed into the virgin light
A fearsome sight
We saw
Of still bodies
And broken limbs,
High
On the mountain slope.

“These are them
A ransom for Zimbabwe;
Fallen
For the liberty of your children,
That you may love and live again.

Broken they lie
On the mountainside,
Yet not in death they lie
But in the tender care of Nehanda, mother;
Anointed of Chaminuka
Priest primordial.

And though their names
Be not on cathedral marbles writ
Yet with throngs
Of living warriors forgotten
They shall forever live.”

Chorus
Et lux perpetua
Luceat eis
Quia pius es