AFRICAN BURDEN

AFRICAN BURDEN by the voice of the soul.
They came in ships, cloaked in
crosses and crowns,
Not to pray with us, but to prey on us.
Not to teach us Truth,
But to tear it from our Tongues.
Chains kissed our wrists like venomous
lovers.
They ripped our fathers,
beat drums out of our mother's breast,
and called it Civilization.
We bled gold into their coffers.
Our diamonds crowned their queens,
Our cocoa sweetens their tea,
And still they called us Savages.
They took our children,
not just from wombs
But from wisdom -
Cut the roots of our languages,
burned the libraries in our stories,
Then asked why we were silent.
In Ghana, in Congo,
on plantations from Mississippi
to Mauritius,
We did not break
We bent.
Bent under bullets,
bent under boots,
bent under borders we never
Drew, but carry on.
They mapped our land,
not to understand,
But to mine it, divide it, devour it.
But listen -
Our rivers still run with memory.
Our mountains whisper names
They tried to erase.
Africa is not a wound.
She is a warrior.
And though her back is burdened,
Her spine still sings.
We carry Pain, yes. But we carry drums too.
Songs still echo in our scars,
And our tears water the roots of the generation unbroken.