And The Island Said Poem by Gert Strydom

I am so strong that I
will conquer the whole wide world,
I will build a railway
right through Africa,

all the way from Cape Town to Cairo
and if women and children are killed,
in the thousands, if I have to destroy
the property, the very life and farms

of those that I want to conquer,
it does not matter,
as the goal of a glorious empire
justifies the means

but when time moved on
and bombs rained down
on her cities,
when V1 and V2 rockets

was turning her to dust,
she prayed against the unjust
she went on her knees,
and demanded justice
as if she had always been pure and just.