Echoing from the Maghreb North

  Down the icy mountains of Bantuland

       To the wet-lands of the Niger delta

        From the poached plains of Masai-land

          To the crimsoned diamonds of Sierra Leone

  Africa weeps.

  For her Peoples,

    Sold on the solemn oaths of demagogues

      Now captive to the Mineral greed of bandit leaders.

       From the nightmare of thieving mandarins

        To her indentured miners

          Shelled into exodus to nowhere

Africa weeps.

    For her transcended children

      Whose manhood rites

        A testimony of severed limbs;

          For her toiling women

            Mendicants amid plenty, and

             Ravaged youth, staring an abyss

               For a future,

Africa weeps.

     When will Africa smile?

        When will the deafening din of mortars

          The frenzied roars of the Alpha

            Be replaced by the cherubic smiles of the sated?

              Of the fed?

Of the contented?

        When will Africa taste

           Of the honey on the Moon?

When will Africa ever smile?