Facing Mt. Kenya


Lord let us pray
Great Ancestor save us this hour
We have shamed you in our wickedness
shedding of blood
Even into the Lord’s House we bring machetes
Slaughtering the innocent
Even the babies
Vote for me, I’ll set you free
And freedom is slavery of the worst kind
What evil spirit has come among us
What strange language this democracy
Brother against brother, tribe against tribe
Oh, Mt. Kenya
Who gave birth to us all
Raise your hands in mercy
We are lost in the forest
Cannot find the way home
Where is our king, where is our queen
What of manhood rites
rites for women
They did not teach us slaughter
Did we learn this at Oxford and Harvard
Help us, Mt. Kenya
This is not the way of the Great Spirit
Not even the way of the jungle beast
This madness for power and greed
Vote for me, I’ll set you free.
Freedom is worse than slavery

We refuse to share
transcend tribe for nation
We the great people
Who became little people
Not the tall Masai warriors
but pigmy of the forest
our heads fat with evil
no justice among the brotherhood
There is no Kwanza
No celebration of harvest
No seven principles of love
Only madness
From Kenya to Somalia
From Sudan to Congo
From Nigeria to Zimbabwe
From Fillmore to Harlem
New Orleans to Philly
Ancestors gather to wail
The people have lost their way
Aping Western man
Voting his way
People starve in the shanties
Politicians order fleets of Mercedes
The colonialists and their lackeys
Brought this chaos
They set borders and boundaries in days past
He taught the schools or filled them with tom teachers
He gave us his language his God
we have lived in misery ever since
At least during the colonial wars
We fought the good cause
But what is this today
Another Rwanda
We learn no lessons
Master no courses in civility
Make fools of history
At this hour let us bow down to. Mt. Kenya
Mt. Kilimanjaro
And cry out mercy and forgiveness
We have sinned like the Western man
We are white with evil
Paint our faces white and wade into Lake Victoria
Wade into the ocean
Cleanse the blood from our hands
Put down the machetes
We are the Great Nation
who gave birth to humanity
Let us return to the course the Ancestors taught
Let us find our way from the forest to the sea.

--M
1/3/08