Of Insane Acts - Prince Mensah

- In memory of Lucky Dube

I read of an act most foul,
a man slain like a fowl,
his blood colored these streets,
the hour glass crashed into bits,
He was a man like you and me
with dreams and longing to be
in company of loved ones always,
obeying whatever love says.

You took his life that night,
O what a sad and bloody sight.
You know your reasons are humdrum,
Just tempos coming from trouble’s drum.
Your unfortunate lives give you no right
to cause, to another family, this plight.
You think we owe you everything;
we owe you jack, nothing!

Our hearts bleed upon this tragedy;
poor children mourn their daddy.
This tragedy that refuses to end,
it takes man, brother and friend.
So guns have taken the place of speech,
violence has become that fattened leech,
brazen, shameless yet so vague
in this bizarre, bloody vogue.

We breathe the same air as you do;
we are bodies, souls, spirits, true
semblances of an Eternal Being;
so why do you vent your spleen
on innocence, on unknown people,
absent and oblivious to the scenes
of your misfortune made simple
by your choice to commit this sin.

The man you slew was a father,
a man who worked, no matter
the excuses of past failures
or shame of poverty’s dentures.
You are weaklings, doomed to squalor
distilled in breweries of dishonor.
See tears in eyes of his dependants,
wear shame on your faces, defendants.

Our hope is that you know and in knowing,
you will show remorse or something
that attempts to compensate sorrow,
mere seeds for a better tomorrow.
You took a life but may your lives be lived
by fireplaces of contemplation, revived
with sparks of his warm songs and memory;
his life becoming your own history.

Poverty is no reason to lose reason,
plight is meant to push a person
to seek heights that shadow valleys,
to seek life beyond those dark alleys.
My wish is that you eat wisdom’s scone,
as your lives march to Justice’s trombone.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

What is going on, Africa? Lucky deserves a great outpouring of tribute.

'How long shall they kill our prophets/while we stand aside and look." - Bob Marley (Redemption Song)

Anonymous said...

Africa is the well of originality and it is up to you poets to show the world what we have had for thousands of years.
This website gives me something to show my foreign friends about the intelligence and potential of African writing. Your future is bright so keep it up.

Anonymous said...

I got extremely disappointed when no one even bothered to write a line or word of condolence for Lucky Dube. Do we expect the same to be done for us when such an event happens to us? What is good for the goose is good for the gander.