We will never leave you
For at the darkest hours we stood by
We know your pain, for we have lived it,
We know what sorrow is, for we have felt it
Kenya, the land of
hypocrites
Where, the sons of mau mau live in holes
Figuratively interred
by the graves of their fathers
Yet you who have
lived the pain, show us your scars
Show us your bullet
marks, strip so that we may witness
We are the defining moment, countrymen and
women,
The point where we are at take-off
We were left by Singapore and Korea
We cannot afford to get lost again
It has always been
defining moments, for all we care
1963 was a defining
moment too
And year by year,
we have grown weary of speeches
Speeches coated
with poetry and stolen from America
With time, brother,
we have shut our ears to those take offs
1963, we had all
the hope, all the dream, all the vision
What makes you
think we are excited by these?
At independence, we swore to fight disease,
ignorance and illiteracy
This remains our rallying call
And with it, we have new challenges,
Corruption at our offices, boss leadership,
Nepotism, favouritism, tunnel-visioned
leadership…
Blah blah blah blah
Name them all, name
them all,
But like a song
from a scratched CD, you annoy,
There was a time we
were excited by you,
You naming all the
vices strangling us
And with the naiveté
we had, we exclaimed,
‘Now, that is our
prophet, our seer’
And with all our energy
from our malnourished stomachs
We carried you
high, your big body weighing upon us,
Some, like victims
of any revolution, died from suffocation
Or dislocated
spines, and we buried them silently
But now, you are no
seer, tell us what you will do
When, how, why, and
if need be slap your forehead
Lick your tongue
and swear before our ancestors
This is the blue-print to our future, Wanjikus,
In it, I lay out what I will do for Kenya
In agriculture for example—no rain-fed
agriculture
In security— two pistols for every cop
In education— a salary hike to teachers
In health— bigger and well-equipped hospitals
Blue-prints, that’s
right,
Written by
technocrats holed up in offices
Consulting on big
tomes and countless reports
Pray, mr.
blue-print, if only you listened to the
Hoes of farmers in
the fields, you wouldn’t speak a thing
The police are shot
every day, their numbers are few,
They live in
decrepit shacks divided by curtains
And there you are,
unashamedly promising them more pistols,
No, they need no
pistols, they need more respect,
To patrol the city
with the dignity worth their ranks
To retreat to
houses that speaks of the Nation’s respect for them
The teachers, the
teachers need not be lied to
As if they were the
children they educate
We owe it to
teachers for who we are,
Pray, was it fair
to reduce all this to carrot and stick?
And health care,
why should it be promised?
Why should doctors
strike?
What message does
it send to a mkokoteni pusher?
You have known me all this time,
I helped establish blah blah blah,
Trust me with this honour,
I am different
I am not like my predecessors
I was in a bad system
I was not corrupt
Same lies, same
mouth, different times,
We have watched you
silently, in disgust,
You talking in our
TVs, speaking filth all your life,
You did less, you
spoke much, you forgot us,
And in the corrupt
system you grew up in,
You trained
yourself how to bend your head,
To look away when
the darkest crimes were committed
Your hands are
filled with blood
Of the many you
killed when you didn’t speak
You looted much,
you gave less,
You have done a
little less out of shame
Not by some sense
of service within you
You are
power-hungry, you are after yourself
And you are
corrupt, very corrupt
What Kenya needs are leaders who can preach
peace
We should not have
a repeat of 2007/2008
Well said, well
said,
Yes, they need
leaders who can preach peace
Not you, not you,
You are the
greatest enemy to Kenya’s peace
If only you had
noticed how the skies sigh
Every time you spew
bilge, you would not speak,
Why is it that
vultures hover around your meetings?
May be I should not
ask, but with respect,
You will do
everyone good if you let Kenya be
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