We Murder Ourselves Poem by Mpho Leteng

Our walk is a walk of fatuous minds to their massacring field;
Our walk is a visionless walk through the foot-path of obliteration,
Yet we still walk down that same road!

We still walk down that same road eyes reeled in strife;
We tread familiar conduits and hope for change to verge upon us!
Our sweat is nothing but another bloody drink to please hell
For we murder ourselves unaware

We pray midnight naked to white gods for black justice!
In return this gods gave us poverty, unemployment and mostly stupidity,
Yet we still walk down that same road praying for better days to come!

We still walk down that same road sightless to the actuality that
there is no government without the people,
We let that putrefaction of power impair our minds and choose to
remain voiceless,
Yet silently we cry for disloyal loyalty, for justice unreservedly unjust
and freedom that will never be free!
but is this the best of you and me?
Is this the best we can ever be?

We burn out in low tones
like the first chants sung around the tribal fires of the Kachikau people
We haul ourselves into depths of self drubbing
We murder ourselves unaware!

From: Steer Away from the shoals (2013)