The Cane And The Pen Poem by Zotena Moses

NARRATOR AND CHORUS POEM
If Words Could Burn

NARRATOR:
If words could burn,
then truth would be fire.
It starts small — a spark in one boy's chest,
a whisper in one girl's mouth,
and before sunrise,
the whole school begins to glow.

CHORUS:
Let the truth burn bright!
Let the truth burn clean!
One voice can shake the wall unseen.

NARRATOR:
They said, 'Keep quiet.'
He said, 'But silence is fear.'
They said, 'Obey.'
She said, 'Even truth obeys God first.'
They said, 'You are just children.'
But they forgot —
children grow into nations.

CHORUS:
We are the children!
We are the flame!
They tried to hide our words —
but truth still came.

NARRATOR:
The cane can break skin,
but it cannot break spirit.
The rule can cage voice,
but it cannot stop wind.
The fear may silence a room,
but not a heart that has found its sound.

CHORUS:
Beat us, mock us, hush us — still we speak!
Truth does not kneel;
it only waits for dawn.

NARRATOR:
The day will come
when the pen will rise like sunrise over every classroom,
and those who beat us
will read our names in books.

CHORUS:
Let the world remember!
Let the walls bear witness!
That one day in Nyanyaa,
truth wore a school uniform
and dared to speak!

NARRATOR:
Not with anger,
not with noise,
but with the courage of a child
who wrote what others feared to write.

CHORUS:
If words could burn —
then our hearts are flame.
If truth could march —
then we have already begun