see despair of our fathers’ faces and wish we hadn’t
fed the cyclic habits tragically governing the colony
reciting them backwards, and then forwards from our memories
until it’s hard to tell the difference between tomorrow and last week
and when our voices challenge systems we suddenly find that we can’t speak
find solace in the promises whispered from the dark streets
without realising the problem is a simple lack of heartbeat
but even social commentaries are just words by their nature
and the writers of reality are forced to practice patience
while hip hop sells it’s soul to a dance of promiscuity
and the poets are disclosed to remember the truth in secrecy
mere observers in the corners of the halls of revolution
biding time by mixing rhymes between the lines of this condition
while the friction of the dreamless masses steals their sleep at night
they’re all just waiting for the Light…somebody give me a mic
lightning strikes in the same place twice
I speak of revolution and a reason to fight
somebody give me a mic…
“please don’t talk about that now”, she asked politely
I replied that I rarely waited for someone to invite me
our society is rotting because of that indifference
“you do what you wanna do, just mind your own business…”
but business is profit and the prophets are quiet
and the ones who truly hear the voice of God are taught to deny it
like painters robbed of colour, or infants from their mothers
we tolerate the blindfolds to separate us from each other
“you’re speaking in riddles and my heart is tired,
maybe you allude to truth, but surely the taste is acquired…
I hired a soothsayer and my soul is soothed now
please go, even if you were right, I still wouldn’t know how…”
quiet! the cycles run riot inside us!
denial and false pious fires that silence
defiance just blinds us like liars behind us
in choirs of violence that rise til we’re mindless
crescendos that echo our deadliest choices
and pop-sing-along melodies that make us envy their voices
the boisterous façade of celebrity wardrobes
that rocket the market while we’re suckered like pocket clones
“wait! you’re a conspiracy theorist with too many metaphors!
hanging with you for a day would give a teenage girl menopause
you’re making me angry and rather upset
is there a reason I don’t even know your name yet?”
hmmm…9 tiny years I’ve been in this game
manifest in many forms like different paintings inside the same frame
names became irrelevant, but my voice is the constant
reminder that a mind exists to whisper in your conscience
so is this rap conscious or merely wack nonsense?
I really don’t mind as long as it generates responses
to hell with indifference and incestuous apathy
I exist in the shadows where your slumber cannot grapple me, and
lightning strikes in the same place twice
I speak of revolution and a reason to fight
somebody give me a mic…
Freshly Sliced, Johannesburg 2009
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