The rich became poor:
In Africa the refugees were given no shelter –
Their welcome ran dry twenty years ago,
A hundred years,
The burden of slavery and exploitation unforgiven.
The marching hordes were turned away,
Fired on,
Raped,
The hunger in their eyes met with bullets,
The rags on their feet torn off,
Their useless watches and finery dropped by the roadside –
So much empty garbage.
Bitter.
The fruit of years of silence and blind eyes turned to suffering was fear and hatred.
The storms had driven the masses south,
The switched Gulf Stream and the rising waters
Forcing them to flee.
It was a desperate strategy,
It was pain,
It was the damned seeking redemption,
The hand servants of the apocalypse
Wailing out their lives in futility.
No going back:
Death had arrived.
Africa, of course, was next,
The droughts and the winds tearing out the heart of that fine continent.
The refugees from the North had merely been the oratorio
Leading the funeral of all mankind.
Pity, then, the hopes that were trodden on,
The possibilities squandered,
The truths ignored,
The realities denied so long ago.
11/2/07
Imagining the rich West collapsing and the population attempting to migrate to Africa
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