Grand Gala 50

The pageantry was pure splendor, you may say I longed for the pomp of it The dazzling ceremony gone when tomorrow goes away The new milk to nourish the tired spirit There is a show man here Left out of everything but his own silence Don't you see it Singers and songs dancing away Potters and painters forgotten The sweet dead comes to life on screen and is met By children like strangers trying hard to remember How they forget, and still not knowing Except the dancehall gift of new liberty. If you had seen beyond the magic You might have known too How compelled I was love the boat on the waters Or anancy's white web bonding us At the edge of another day's feast. Every industry was there incoherent still And Rastaman lost his voice, they spoke for him Much better than that other silence And buzzard's beak breathing on his life. I was waiting still for the dignitaries ... beyond my expectation Or the pocomania excluded from the nation. I drank my cup of pride in slow, long sips.