Woman In Chains
she carries the child on tired hips rested on chains ‘round her waist
wasted on freedom designed to serve a white man’s lustful desire
branded inferior as time repeats itself and the pain knows no end
a tattoo on her skin confirms her as chattel in self-righteous shackles
festering wounds of Apartheid resemble the foul stench of humanity
as her child suckles from an empty breast and cries out for more
they did not really abandon slavery merely gave it a different name
too sweet are the rewards of exploiting the world as we know it
division of labour and they enshrined her firmly as an illiterate pawn
her soul wrapped in skin and bones and her eyes like rusted steel
an empty gaze almost gave up on merits of justice from hollow eyes
camped in concentration of power domination she is raped daily
of her dignity while she ploughs on in fields of plenty and the dust
of history and yet she never gives up on struggle for emancipation
some got the vote in a rigged system with dice slicing the fortune
disembowled by wolves in capital’s fangs her innermost treasure
has become hope that succumbs to memories of her forebears
born into poverty and meant to stay there she rattles her manacles
in vain in defeat because leg irons and handcuffs are made from
diamonds and gold in the heartland of theft and misappropriation
when her child dies she carries another from the master’s loins
expendable and forgotten her tears are salty and polish the gyves
and just maybe might help to corrode bilboes and unholy bonds
because human emotions do not forget who triggered the hurt
outcast in a so called homelands or locations she requires a pass
to enter the kingdom of opulence in which she serves as a maid
but the young maiden has become old and dies cleaning their dirt
a stolen life is all that her daughters will remember with hatred
and when they rise they too will die by the greed of their captors
but one day the tables will turn and revolve in anger and retribution
20th August 2020
‘Apartheid’ in South Africa was the system of racial discrimination
Workers needed a ‘passbook’ to enter rich suburbs for work
‘Homelands’ were the allocated regions where black people would live
Their abodes where called ‘locations’ to sweeten the tongue of evil
Copyright © Kai Michael Neumann | Year Posted 2020
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