Something Happened

When you come home, my son

you will see with your own eyes

that something happened to Africa

You will see it in the red, naked fury

of the flames that pour forth

from the belly of the sanctuary

The dark, portentous plumes

of smoke slowly rising to touch the sky.

The bluest sky you ever saw

The gathering of flinty eyed men

spitting damnation, curses, vulgarisms.

Their machetes dripping little pools of blood

Armed, frightened policemen

Running! Running from the fire

and from the men with the machetes

The bloated corpse on Market Street

feeding the vultures and scavengers, hungry

gloomy children watch with open mouths

My neighbour’s daughter

crying the saddest tears she ever will

as soldiers have their way and shoot the sky

Green weeds, their angry tentacles

strangling the aged and falling walls

of the old primary school by the church

The empty church, looted and burned long ago

Now opened to the elements, squatters, miscreants

and the vermin that live in dank places

Lonely mother, wailing through the night

Mourning the children she lost, and

the life she’d hoped to have

Rows of white clad corpses

packed tightly like sardines

waiting for burial in the potter’s grave

My son, when you return

you will see like I see and know like I do,

Something happened to Africa

Something happened here