Pleading Guilty
We’re pleading guilty to the charges.
As owners,
Salesmen,
Killers at large.
We’re pleading guilty to the charges.
It was a John who began it
Soon we all cashed in
Liverpool, Bristol, London
Backed by the Royal kin.
Brutality was
The reality
Behind the building of Blighty
And a deluded Christianity
Watched a greedy high society
Put a price on our humanity
Which was going for a Zong.
We’re pleading guilty to the charges.
We dealt on a black market
That one of us started
We were caught white handed
Now we’re sure red faced.
But different colour’s no excuse
For brothers and sisters we displaced
And battered and bruised and beat and raped and chained and renamed and sold and disgraced.
We’re pleading guilty to the charges.
Hideous plantations
Funded glorious colonisations-
At our lavish celebrations
We didn’t veil the truth.
Tom, Dick, Mary, Jane
Knew Britannia owned the waves
And the slaves
We kept as livestock
In full view
Were hammered away.
We’re pleading guilty to the charges.
Put above our own kind
Money
Made us blind
But as we dealt
In people’s lives
We saw the pain
In their eyes
Heard the horror
Of their cries
Smelt their blood
Held the knives.
Shipping away dreams
From those of same mind
Stripping away dignity
Our unforgivable crime.
We’re pleading guilty to the charges.
In our defence, we were first to abort
As our integrity lay on life-support
Amazing Grace
Was another John’s thought
And for abolition Wilberforce fought.
And won.
We’re pleading guilty to the charges.
Condemned to the cell of history
With the Code of Hammurabi
Where no official apology
Can heal the stinging wounds.
May we never forget
Our forefathers’ thefts
And let those shameful ship decks
In the past stay marooned.
We’re pleading guilty to the charges.
With this life sentence
Forever we’ll do time
But grant bail to our future
Moral compass realigned.
The past is a foreign country
They do things differently there
Let’s move contrition into action
And unlock peace if we dare.
Start living to love our neighbour
Stop the war for material gain
Listen up
(It’s 2012)
But don’t you still hear the chains?
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IMAGE: Jon|k
