Our Revolution Must Be Different…

Our Revolution Must Be Different...

Warrior/Houngan we salute you
Frail body
Towering spirit
it is a savagery/that you have known.

Our Revolution must be different

Limping wizard
prophet of the tribe
it is brutality/visited upon you

Our Revolution must be different

it is not
it is not
it is not enough'-
to make a change
to make blood
to make slaughter

Our Revolution must be different

Our poets cannot be eaten
Our shepherds cannot be stoned
We rip out the logos of our  beginnings
We trample the heaven-heart of our growth

Our Revolution must be different

.........

Rise beyond  scalpel and missile
Reach up for quantum and love

Our Revolution must be different
reshaping landscapes  of hope
Remembering our beginnings
after blood must come pan song
and wing

Rhythmic tremors/rockers brothers
it is a savagery, a brutality, a slaughter-
but your voice is our song
And will reggeh down the drum-tracks of time

( source: from The Heinemann book of  Caribbean Poetry)