I Am A Citizen Poem by Tony Adah

They depose that I am a tenant
Upon my own heritage
A minion unredeemed by the sweat
Of his toil tilling till dusk
A black face on a black soil
A dreary land with wealth
Carted away to modify the slave masters' life.

They said all citizens are cotenants
Codified in one same niche I occupy
We lay prostrate like servants
Before the king
We puzzle over our unequal being
In a seed bed without a farm to grow
And melancholy ours
As splendour is theirs.