In My Fatherland

Flowers of peace are now magnificently blossoming In the gardens of the battlefields of Khartoum and Kinshasa. And roses of tranquillity and order slowly blooming In the flower pots of Kigali’s sorrowful genocide cites. The smoke of dead gun-fire still flies In the skies of the outskirts of Monrovia and Abidjan. But live sporadic gunfire persistently lightens In the troubled skies of Bunjumbula and Mogadishu. Hot waters of hunger, starvation and suffering still pour On the heads of Harare and Adisababa. And the lines of untold poverty are still drawn Across the villages of Lilongwe and Bamako. The string of absolute monarchy is still tight Around the political circles of Mbabane. And the chains of an authoritarian state Still hang around the neck of Innocent Tripoli. Freedom then denied to free civilians Is now freely enjoyed by freer people of Freetown. But the rights of free civilians in Banju Are tightly held in a knot of military dictatorship. The barrels of guns of power hungry politicians Are now silent in the roads of Brazzaville. But northern villages and jungles of Kampala Are still infested with the disease of rebel attack. Maputo and Luanda are now being built Out of the mud of the longest and brutal wars. And the dirty white walls of the hated apartheid Are now being splendidly painted black in Johannesburg. The smell of peace, progress, poverty and panic surely hangs In the corners of my sincerely beloved fatherland. And the wave of sickness, suffering and starvation still hits The peoples of my dear beautiful Fatherland.