Dust Storm at Marikana
Despairing women, hurting in the dust,
Raise voices on the over heated air
their crying songs billowing the void
erupting in a cold dry morning storm.
Desperate men scraped a living from the dust
Resolute in their right to dignity
Claim a place, to stand, to arm, to fight.
–––– "Justice shall be mined"
they shout, and rush into a rout.
A hail of missiles, hell of blood, inequity.
–––– Justice is doubly armed, and blind.
Dying men scratching at the dust
revenge, reprieve, remorse, release;
Hands, fingers, nails, scraping an escape
Rest in a final fist of native rust.
Dead faces frozen in the dust
Denounce the sworn assurance
The suited promise of finely crafted rights
An end of all the darkness, and of night.
False men gather, touristing the dust
Their hurricane of words a deluge of deception
opinions blizzard across the landscape littered
with freedom’s hope, wasted in the dust.
A swirling fog mixing in the dust
blinding the truth, guttering the light
Where poor men died, mothers cried
And great laws lied.
A nation lost in a howling silence
And the keening lament of women
Asking Why?
About this: In August, 2012, South African police fired on striking miners at Marikana, killing 34, and injuring 78. The police arrested another 270 miners, and charged them with the murder of their 34 dead colleagues. It was the worst mass killing by the state since the end of apartheid and the advent of constitutional democracy.