MADIBA 2

Here's what they will say Baba:
they will say you were a peace-maker
that you did not despise your jailers
that at your inauguration as the first
black president of South Africa, your
jailers sit on the front row. That your 
captors smiled at you as you were
sworn in to lead a country they
ravished (remember how Botha
gave money from the national treasure
to white Afrikaaners just before you
were elected and left the country
bankrupt?). They will say you were
a lion, yes, but tame and toothless
that in your old age--71 when you
emerged from Robben Island--
you had mellowed, that you were
no longer "a terrorist." They will
say that you were no threat to anyone
after being broken 27 years in a
cell; that your tear ducts were a
necessary sacrifice for the lives
lost because of a revolution you
insisted must happen--why  should
you be able to cry, Baba, given all
the tears you caused? They will
say it is best to find the most
benign sayings you ever said, that
you--like Martin and Malcolm--
saw the light in the end and knew
the joy of "good white people," that
you did not wish ill on the most
evil among them. They will say
you called evil good. 

We will have to piece together a picture
of you from all your lives--not just the one
the tamed ones want to portray. We know,
Baba, that you are a warrior, a freedom 
fighter, that you chose not to hate in order
to be the ruler of your own soul--it was 
a strategy for survival and for revolution.
Love always is. I don't know how, Great
Lion. But we will not let them paint
you toothless. We know you fierce. We
know you proud. We know you leader.
We know you strong. We will not let
them leave you, weak and mild in the
corner of history when you stood strong
for the world, for us. Somehow, Baba,
we will help keep the story straight.

© Valerie Bridgeman
December 6, 2013