Middle and upper class South Africa is more likely to be concerned about the loss of a Springbok or Bafana Bafana game than the degradation of our lives. Nationalism is more than sport or propaganda peace missions in central Africa. Nationalism doesn’t belong to the blind! Nationalism belongs to those with eyes and hearts wide open. Nationalists don’t criticize without dedicating themselves to action.
Tim Pepper, a USA musician i knew from the years he spent in Durban, wrote this poem. You could take it as a warning but much better to take it as advice:
LITTLE WHITE CROSSES
Cover the hills with little white crosses
row by row by row by row
Cover the flats, cover the vlei;
a queue of crosses breaks each new day
The green and gold of a rustic nation
is eroding, fading, wasting, changing
into the red of ribbons and the white of crosses
But nothing changes, no one pauses
Bloody ribbons, anaemic crosses,
the legacy of a cheated generation
The lies passed on from father to son
so crosses the landscape over-run
A sleeve to plaster, a pill to swallow;
dressings for the wound of a cancerous lie
Still the marching crosses march
like so many soldiers, suited and starched
Let go the culture, reject status quo
or cover the hills with little white crosses
…row by row by row by row…
PS: Thanks to Tim for letting me post this. It wasn’t even on his own website yet. Sure that he’ll make it into a protest song one day. You can download most of his music for free here. I highly recommend ‘Something Inside Me’ and ‘Life’ from his Beautiful Frustration album. I love thinkers.
