We Shall Return, Luanda by Ngudia Wendel

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Luanda, you are like a white seagull

on the ocean crest –

bright streets under the white sun,

flight of green palm trees…

but we have seen you grow black, Luanda,

since the bitter fourth of February

when the blood of combatants for liberty

was spilled in your streets –

in your bright streets,

Mother Luanda.

We remember that day

your streets seething with crowds

like the Cuanza in flood.

Our rage thundered louder than the cannon

in the executioner’s fortress.

And we went to the attack through a hail of lead

and we died in your streets –

in your bright streets,

Mother Luanda.

Through battle we won victory

on that bitter day,

hundreds of our black brothers

were stretched out for eternity in your streets.

We came through the bush

through the long tropical rains,

the wounded moaned on their stretchers

ammunition belts stained their backs,

legs were caught fast in treacherous swamps,

but we came on to see you,

our Mother Luanda.

But you stranger and hangman

have drowned Luanda in blood,

you have fed on the living body for ages

like the bush tick.

Now you tremble and cling to your sandbags

and steel helmets

and the shelter of machine-guns

wisely, for you know

that the moment of reckoning

is nigh.

One day we shall come out of the bush

through the smoke of the last explosives

and we shall see you, Luanda,

the ships in the bay –

big-bellied ships, hurriedly packed

with the last of the murderers…

That day is not over the hills, far away,

it is close at hand