Mandela - The Immortal Icon
The Peace Warrior Of Mzansi, among heroes - a colossus!
Sun Of The Nation; a rare gift of Providence.
Once, entangled in the web of racist succubus;
Unruffled he declares before High Justice:
'[I]t is an ideal for which I am prepared to die! ' Silence -
Pregnant with dreadful menace in court ensued.
A beast of burden consequent of unshakeable stance.
In the slammer Symbol Of The Struggle he attained;
But Apartheid demon persisted in its Treachery.
'Coalition Of Conscience' inspired outcry for Liberty;
Million Man March Poem
The night has been long,
The wound has been deep,
The pit has been dark,
And the walls have been steep.
Under a dead blue sky on a distant beach,
I was dragged by my braids just beyond your reach.
Your hands were tied, your mouth was bound,
You couldn't even call out my name.
You were helpless and so was I,
A Visit From Wisdom
In the stillness of night Wisdom came and stood
By my bed. She gazed upon me like a tender mother
And wiped away my tears, and said : 'I have heard
The cry of your spirit and I am come to comfort it.
Open your heart to me and I shall fill it with light.
Ask of me and I shall show you the way of truth.'
And I said : 'Who am I, Wisdom, and how came
I to this frightening place? What manner of things
Are these mighty hopes and these many books and
What Stephen Lawrence Has Taught Us
We know who the killers are,
We have watched them strut before us
As proud as sick Mussolinis',
We have watched them strut before us
Compassionless and arrogant,
They paraded before us,
Like angels of death
Protected by the law.
It is now an open secret
Fears In Solitude
A green and silent spot, amid the hills,
A small and silent dell ! O'er stiller place
No singing sky-lark ever poised himself.
The hills are heathy, save that swelling slope,
Which hath a gay and gorgeous covering on,
All golden with the never-bloomless furze,
Which now blooms most profusely : but the dell,
Bathed by the mist, is fresh and delicate
As vernal corn-field, or the unripe flax,
When, through its half-transparent stalks, at eve,
Blot On Humanity
It is darkest hour in our history,
Dark nights shrouded with mystery,
Keeping under heels and making mockery,
Liberty torch shine but under label of slavery,
We may hide cruel face under facial,
Abuses hurl and utterances very racial,
Delicate phase but survival very crucial,
Efforts needed nor normal but very special,
Asleep! O Sleep A Little While, White Pearl!
Asleep! O sleep a little while, white pearl!
And let me kneel, and let me pray to thee,
And let me call Heaven’s blessing on thine eyes,
And let me breathe into the happy air,
That doth enfold and touch thee all about,
Vows of my slavery, my giving up,
My sudden adoration, my great love!
A Nation Of Cowards
(Dedicated to you, my Brothers and Sisters)
Powerful words,
Truthful words,
Honest words,
Brave words;
This is exactly what the Doctor orders,
For a nation, who's trying to fight the horrors
Of blatant racism,
Unfairness, injustice,
As I Sat Alone By Blue Ontario's Shores
AS I sat alone, by blue Ontario's shore,
As I mused of these mighty days, and of peace return'd, and the dead
that return no more,
A Phantom, gigantic, superb, with stern visage, accosted me;
Chant me the poem, it said, that comes from the soul of America-
chant me the carol of victory;
And strike up the marches of Libertad- marches more powerful yet;
And sing me before you go, the song of the throes of Democracy.
(Democracy- the destin'd conqueror- yet treacherous lip-smiles
Contemplation Of The Sword
Reason will not decide at last; the sword will decide.
The sword: an obsolete instrument of bronze or steel,
formerly used to kill men, but here
In the sense of a symbol. The sword: that is: the storms
and counter-storms of general destruction; killing
of men,
Destruction of all goods and materials; massacre, more or
less intentional, of children and women;
Destruction poured down from wings, the air made accomplice,
the innocent air
Nightmares Of Slumbering Africa
Colonialism in its last moments is pushed to the centre stage -
the recoiling phenomenon intensely illuminated
by The Flame Of Liberty.
Roused by the prospect of emancipatory freedom,
from the shadows of Servitude, nations rise.
Their demand for a dawn long on hold
brings an end to the colonial yoke.
Her soul refreshed with a breath of new life,
Africa thrills at the sight of the expanding horizons -
Prometheus
COVER thy spacious heavens, Zeus,
With clouds of mist,
And, like the boy who lops
The thistles' heads,
Disport with oaks and mountain-peaks,
Yet thou must leave
My earth still standing;
My cottage too, which was not raised by thee;
Leave me my hearth,
Whose kindly glow
Black Man's Dilemma
Where would we go if told to leave
This land where our kidnapped forefathers grieved
For life as it once were
And not as destiny's mind perceived
We have no heritage to call our own
Where could we go if summarily thrown
From this oasis of bigotry and hate
Long....our adopted home
The Vampire
You that, like a dagger’s thrust,
Have entered my complaining heart,
You that, stronger than a host
Of demons, came, wild yet prepared;
Within my mind’s humility
You made your bed and your domain;
- Infamous one who’s bound to me
Like any felon by his chain,
Hymn To Intellectual Beauty
The awful shadow of some unseen Power
Floats through unseen among us, -- visiting
This various world with as inconstant wing
As summer winds that creep from flower to flower, --
Like moonbeams that behind some piny mountain shower,
It visits with inconstant glance
Each human heart and countenance;
Like hues and harmonies of evening, --
Like clouds in starlight widely spread, --
Like memory of music fled, --
A Woman
In the world of Saints
I would have been an Angel.
In the world of Peace
I would have been a Dove.
In the world of Passion
I would have been Love.
In the world of a Prayer
I would have been Praise.
In the world of Science
I would have been a Fact.
Freedom
When will this thirst for freedom slake?
When will our love of slavery die?
When will our Mother's fetters break?
When will our tribulations cease?
Wasn't there another Bharat
Reared by our noble Aryan race?
Lead us, Aryan, to victory!
Is't right we remain slaves?
Song Of Man Xxv
I was here from the moment of the
Beginning, and here I am still. And
I shall remain here until the end
Of the world, for there is no
Ending to my grief-stricken being.
I roamed the infinite sky, and
Soared in the ideal world, and
Floated through the firmament. But
Why I Am Not A Christian
About a decade had passed
Bertrand Russell had written
Why I Am Not a Christian
In 1957
It was an Essay
An effort to perform or attempt
A French Word
In writing
Song Of The Son
Pour O pour that parting soul in song
O pour it in the sawdust glow of night
Into the velvet pine-smoke air tonight,
And let the valley carry it along.
And let the valley carry it along.
O land and soil, red soil and sweet-gum tree,
So scant of grass, so proligate of pines,
Now hust before an epoch's sun declines
Thy son, in time, I have returned to thee,
Thy son, I have in time returned to thee.