Silver lining

Sweet and seductive, right before your very eyes.
Yet so illusive, everybody is in desperate need for more.
From the minute I walked through that earthly door.
Whether the sun shone or the rains were commanded to pour.
This life I was given to explore.

As the day’s role by, whether cloudy grey or blue sky.
To say I don’t enjoy living would be an absolute lie.
Nevertheless I keep a steady eye on the horizon.
A constant observation, my words I hold in reservation.
Scared of my own ambition, they say young man you don’t listen.
How can I, when most of what you say is all fiction.
Gladly I would lend my ear to reason.
As long as it doesn’t entail the erosion of my freedom.
I wish not to be an inmate of your fenceless prison.

Just the other day came across an elder.
Seventy something, told me about the times of his father.
I sat almost an hour, until he said there is no hope for Africa.
And if there was, a step back to colonialism was the only way.
I looked at him with dismay; I said are you sure of what you say.

It was before my time, slavery and punishment wasn’t it along that line.
Didn’t you cry and beg for freedom, didn’t you watch the raping of our kingdom.
A reply so shocking, yet from his words came a disguised blessing.
He said the past is the past and we surely learnt our lesson.
An outsider or my brother either way it always will be oppression.
Only difference is one wants my land, the other with a gun or knife wants my life.

His words only fuelled me with spoken ammunition.
I said I am in search of a revolution, and it includes no submission.
Before I lie on my deathbed, or catch a bullet to the head.
Before my soul leaves my body and floats out without a whisper.
My mission is my people, Africa from the vultures we shall deliver.

So many young souls blessed with wisdom in abundance.
Youth so intelligent in the depth of their eyes shines resilience.
Put your faith and hopes in your kin and guide them with diligence.

In your eyes I see the shame, but rest assured it will not remain.
In this world if one of us is not free then we are all to blame.
You can’t attain your future if you never embrace your past.
One day I will sit with you once more, enjoying better days then the last.

Hamza egal
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