A News Report About A Young Farmer Poem by Gert Strydom

On the news on Pretoria-FM
I have heard about a young farmer,
living alone in a separate house,
on his father's farm
who had been attacked

by a group of black robbers,
wielding AK-47 machineguns
and knives, they stabbed him
multiple times in the back.

in his face and neck
and after they had taken everything
that they though have got value
he asked them to spare his life.

When they told him to undress
he realised that they
were going to kill him,
jumped right through the window
in the lounge, shattering glass,

cutting himself and they followed him
through the thorn bushes,
but he managed to escape
as it was at night

and he went into the shelter of his father's barn
which set the alarm off,
where his father found him barely alive
and everything that was left in his house,
was broken and smashed to pieces.

[Reference: Pretoria-FM is a Afrikaans radio station broadcasting from Pretoria.]