And with a knowing glint in their eye they’ll say you can apply,

Then they’ll stuff your open mouths with a piece of American pie

Saying . . .

The Arts Council criteria for funding is to conform,

And as we are paying the revolution, the revolution will perform.

And like puppets on barbed wire

We dance in this fire

And we – becoming the actresses and actors – are forgetting the plot.

Knowing so much that we needed something but not knowing what.

And we try to ignore this cynicism while stuffing our pockets with gold,

Saying, well, if they give it then take it, that’s what I was told.

But the Arts Council criteria for funding is to conform,

Which means if they pay the revolution, the revolution will perform.

And Marcus Garvey turns in his grave seeing the liberalism he fought,

Seeing the modern-day slave being sold and being bought.

One slave was allocated to dance, another was commissioned to write poetry.

It was an unwritten law that if we dance, write, sing and paint,

we will forget about our slavery.

Time is being intricately fooled, and we are the fools,

’Cause if we take a look over the chimney pots we’re being ridiculed.

Yes, the revolution will be hidden for another hundred years,

Or at least as long as governmental funding is here.

And an added bonus is getting us to believe in multiculturalism,

Again keeping our minds from the real situation.

That the Arts Council criteria for funding is to conform,

And if it pays the revolution, the revolution will perform.

Yes, we are a beautiful people, because through all this we still see light,

But just like the winter

The days are getting shorter,

And will we know what to do in the night?

Every second counts, every minute minute, every haunting hour.

This country is exerting a silent massacre.

Every second counts, every minute minute, every harrowing hour.

Ask yourself and seek the answer: where is the fund for

Black Power?

From Rebel without Applause (1992)

REBEL WITHOUT APPLAUSE

Bearing Witness

Bearing Witness

(Dedicated to James Baldwin who in his last recorded interview said black writers should bear witness to the times.)

Bearing witness to the times

Where it pays to sell lines,

Where African thighs thrive for twenty-five,

And guns run with the midnight son.

Bearing witness to the days

Of the blue-eyed glaze

In the black-eyed girl of the world

Whose life depends on a contact lens.

Bearing witness to the screams

Of children cut on shattered dreams,

Colonialised minds lost in times

Of permanent frowns and nervous breakdowns.

Bearing witness to the signs

Of white sandstorms in black minds,

Of waves from the west with white dagger crests

Scratching the black beaches back.

Bearing witness to the hour

Where maladjusted power

Realigns its crimes in token signs,

Then perversely repents with self-punishment.

Bearing witness to the times

Where black people define

The debt yet to be paid, you bet.