Where are the cameras, the microphones
held ready when politicians sneeze?
Where are the ‘current news’ crews who
habitually hang on big mens’ sleeves?
Where are they when three hundred
nameless faceless lives are lost?
Machismo-driven ‘protectors’ walk free
scant remorse for ethical lines crossed
.
Why no outrage when corpses are left to
bleed out in a puddle in the desert
of concrete and metal boxes, or worse still
charred and tossed as leaders remain inert?
Headlines scream ‘Brain Drain’ as
privilege, packing for yesterday
repudiates sacrifice of sugared comfits
dismisses goals for collective right of way
No headlines for the untouchables –
the unnamed dead, their not-worth-naming kin –
looters, violent black bodies in mobs
shamelessly profiled – Not. Quite. Human.
Ayesha Kajee is a storyteller, poet and rights activist whose research on governance and democracy in many parts of sub-saharan Africa has been published in various media. An educator at both secondary and tertiary levels, she previously directed an international human rights programme at Wits University, where she also lectured Politics and International Relations courses. Ayesha was briefly the director of the Freedom of Expression Institute before quitting full-time work to care for an invalid parent. Her research interests include post-conflict transformation, socio-economic renewal and gender and media rights.
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Love connecting now with the poems you write. I also write, but so seldom. When I was at school I wrote tons of poems, and also at varsity, but now, so very seldom. Thank you for your poetry, it touches old spaces in my soul and rekindles flames of lives gone by. – David
Very relevant and true.
So powerful!