joke

sitting in a bar with two friends

when the first one turns to me

the second laughs as he tells a joke

which paints a black man as a thief



lying in bed in the half-light

world service by my side

quietly tells of steve biko

and the tale of how that black man died



a word becomes a notion

and a notion is a seed

which may grow to an attitude

and give rise to a deed;

fly a plane into a tower

rape as a tool of war

exterminate by gassing

locked in behind an air-tight door



sitting in a bar with two friends

when the first one turns to me

the second laughs as he tells a joke

which paints a black man as a thief