In Kamuna’s calm, they queue and cling,
To court a king who lost his wing.
The bride is old, her gown is grey,
Yet suitors swarm both night and day.
.
They chant his name with lips once cold,
Now dreams are bought, and shame is sold.
The man they mocked, they now revere,
Such politics, both far and near.
.
Al-Sufai fled with cloak of pride,
To SPD, where hopes now hide.
He knelt before the northern lord,
To seek a nod, not truth or sword.
.
“What changed?” we ask, with furrowed brow,
“The tide,” they say, “has turned somehow.”
But tides don’t turn without the moon,
This moon, it seems, has risen soon.
.
Afikum came with softest tread,
With Sallah gifts and words unsaid.
He swore it’s peace, no plots, no pact,
Yet whispered winds betray the act.
.
Gandullar came in garb of gold,
With tales of strength and legacies told.
He laughed at talks of fractured foes,
Yet feared the cracks that daily grows.
.
Gubari sat, the sphinx in white,
While loyalists danced left and right.
Once blamed for ruin, now embraced,
The past they cursed is now retraced.
.
Machiavelli, in his grave,
Might grin at how the sly behave.
“For morals die where power is born,
And roses bloom where fields are torn.”
.
Orwell’s ghosts now rise and speak,
As truths are twisted week by week.
“Beware,” they warn, “of words well-groomed,
For lies in ribbons are still doomed.”
.
Jung would scoff: “They dodge their guilt,
And bathe in mud their kingdoms built.”
Why cleanse the soul when dirt can pay?
Why sow new seeds when weeds can stay?
.
Achebe’s cry still haunts the land,
Where leaders lead with trembling hand.
“The problem,” he once boldly said,
“Is heads too hollow, hearts too dead.”
.
De Tocqueville whispers through the mist,
Of citizens who shrug and twist.
“The leaders match the people’s face,
A mirror cracked, a shared disgrace.”
.
Fanon thunders from the skies,
“Silence is where true freedom dies.”
Complicity in stolen dreams,
Is louder than rebellious screams.
.
Marx would murmur, “Farce begins,
When past repeats in fraud and sins.”
They sell us rot wrapped up in silk,
And call it gold, and bread, and milk.
.
Max Weber’s bore through boards is gone,
Now shortcuts shape what they lean on.
No passion for a noble cause,
Just scheming deals and shifting laws.
.
See them dance in dusty halls,
The same old names, the same old calls.
Defections dressed as destiny,
While truth decays in secrecy.
.
The people watch with weary eyes,
And wonder if they’re ruled by lies.
For every fall, a fool’s return,
In every ash, they praise the burn.
.
James Baldwin sighs, “When power’s blind,
And ignorance walks close behind,
Justice weeps in trembling tones,
While truth is gagged and thrown with stones.”
.
And so they flirt with past disgrace,
While masking shame with smiling face.
The beautiful bride they now reframe,
Is but the ghost of power’s flame.
.
Let youth arise and break the chain,
And see through all the sweet refrain.
For in this theatre of deceit,
Only the brave make change complete.
.
*©️…J. A*
Comment here