Political Incorrectness

wild fires on Table Mountain spread their ugly flames onto the University centre of learning old books in the ancient library smouldering ashes of bygone wisdom student quarters burnt just the same nature does not discriminate or does it when readers fall prey to the elements of destruction in temporal knowledge that some things will never be the same scorched they gather what was not to be reach out to quaint philosophers for truths but the pages grant furious fodder link tinder wood they light up for once they have the limelight in times of ignorance some say at least it was not the colonialists' fault flint stones made radiant sparks long before and the Chinese invented firecrackers way before the British doped them in opium a sterling idea of potent delirious subjugation others weigh in and claim it was provenance or politician’s corruption and underfunding of the local emergency services or even lack of water and evidence of climate change but one way or other resides some Apartheid it was Heinrich Heine who pointed out clearly that once they burn books humans will follow and it may have been more than a cigarette that ignited the bush veldt as a reminder while conspiracy theories keep infernos alive 21st April 2021