Poem: The change that chained us
The Change That Chained Us
Saidu Bangura. Praia, September 1, 2022.
We wanted change
we cried for change
we prayed for change
and change really came
as it has always come
in the prescribed calendar
in regular intervals for a
change of actors (or of looters?)
thinking it would be new,
the change we dinned for,
clamoured for yesterday –
for it is not new where
the actors come from the
same rainbow of colours
and keep playing the same
game of loot and let’s loot –
where only the looters can
decide the style of looting
and slowly our people
began to see and live
that nothing has changed
when we face the same
mountains of troubles,
the same endless needs;
when we keep praying
the same old prayers
when our old looters
from the same schools
have not changed the game –
how they preyed on us
how they suffocate us
how they arrogantly
mistreat us, and chain us
in the change we thought
were new, would have been
real, the real change we need
what is your prayer this time?
which looter do you pray for?
what fashion of predator do you
wish for this time: the meek working
looter or the conceited predator who
gives you the change that chains you?
Or are both the same: looters and predators
in the change that has chained us for decades?
The Author
Dr Saidu Bangura is an Assistant Professor at the University of Cape Verde. He lectures in the English Studies Course, Faculty of Social Sciences, Humanities and Arts, University of Cape Verde. He holds a BA, English & Linguistics (FBC, USL); PhD in Translation, Communication, and Culture with a specialty in English Linguistics (University of Las Palmas, Canary Islands, Spain).
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