The August Leaders' Meeting (From Shout for Freedom), is the final poem for this month from Jamaican poet, Sir Philip Sherlock.
The August Leaders' Meeting
Is a sign of the times, is a signal to we
when we hear the murmuring murmuring growing
growing and spreading and every eye turning
and ever voice lifting in cries to we Father.
Is sign that freedom is coming.
Just two days back I stand and watch
the Greenwich Big Gang moving to the field
and I see how the driver careful with him whip
him beat the weaker but don't touch the stronger
and I say to myself 'The driver know say time
is longer far than any rope and rope is running out,'
and as I watch, I feel the morning breeze,
the freedom breeze begin to blow
and then the revelation vision grip me,
how the kings of the earth and the rich men and mighty
how the chief men and leaders and slave and the freemen
hide in the rocks like coney and bawl out
and plead with the rocks
and plead with the mountain to fall down upon them
and hide them,
'Fall down upon we,' them call out, 'and hide we
from the terrible face of the Lord, oh hide we
from the Lamb on the throne, oh hide we
for now is the judgment when Massa God rise up in wrath
and who can stand up in that day?
Copyright Philip Sherlock 1987
From Our Yard. Jamaican Poetry Since Independence. Jamaica 21 Anthology Series. Edited by Pamela Mordecai. Institute of Jamaica Publications Limited. 1987
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