Francis Kokutse - Last Post

We shall not blow a bugle
from the roof top in their memory
because our people did not die
they withered away in the Atlantic
as if they were leaves destroyed.

Our voices have even gone dry
so we cannot sing for them because
what can we say about them to
appease their souls crying daily
to the almighty to avenge their death?

We have refused to wear poppy badges
not because we do not respect the dead.
It is our protest that our forebears were
not treated well by mankind.

So in silence we shall remember them all;
Kpende, son of Kpodo from Aneho,
Camara, the son of the Lion of Wolof,
Segun, he who hunts the hunted from Ejebu
and the numerous ones whose names we
cannot ever know but whose blood still
flows to our shores from the Atlantic;
as the sun rises from its sleep till it decides to
hides its face from we mortals, we shall forever
have you on our minds.

Francis Kokutse

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