dent

                        i. 
                         the seat            is upon us        again
solemn, yet      a reminder of death 

                        faith, love & forgiveness       

amplified by    stripes sheep, astray                and 
laid      thus     that sacrifice   unknown foe

                        pierced            six thousand    sons     on target
to         end      the       population 

the nation        pain is going on          active              over
the woods                    police conformity with law
                        gain failure  marked    as         Government

protect             each other       until     poses               threat 
to things that are not like        the revival       witnessed 

   dent, again               bright              on  everything 
            I           appeal to you, in the blood spilled on us   

                        ii.
            I           appeal to you, in the blood spilled on us   
come               lift       lives    into absence

wave    the       organisation    to         rise      tragically
mark    a          day      report a          stand

guard               the       breach disregard the   economy 
lives    steer    our       nation onto     path

fortune            is extremely troubling
wearing                       exceptions with           recklessness

            majority          gathers            to eat, drink, laugh      and talk
in subject to spite the huge dependence                      foreign regard

government forging    funds for development
short    is the   capacity to       finish 

come to life     have no doubt 
            God too shall pass       the battle         for the night

Copyright © 2022 by Henneh Kyereh Kwaku. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on June 15, 2022, by the Academy of American Poets.

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“‘i’ and ‘ii’ are excerpted from a sonnet sequence in progress. The attempt is loosely inspired by Terrance Hayes’s and Wanda Coleman’s American Sonnets. However, these sonnets are also erasure poems extracted from speeches by Ghanaian presidents. What does it mean to say a country is murderous—your beloved country? What does it mean to say that you sacrifice for your country when it’s trying to sacrifice you? You know the truth: these politicians will sacrifice you for the money.”
—Henneh Kyereh Kwaku