Hold up
Don’t talk
Or the grim reaper will steal your voice.
Words turn weapons stripped of choice
Next you're in cuffs
Bound and subdued
Dragged to halls where fairness is skewed.

“Arise my Lord” the bailiff calls
But justice has crumbled within those walls.
Judged for truths you dared to say
Now silenced tossed like waste-away.
In the jungle of law where power preys
Your rights dissolve in a smoky haze.

In the heart of the city beneath neon lights
Lies Mide a dreamer who fought for rights.
He raised his voice against the pain
Of inflation... of hunger... a nation insane.
He penned his words in the dead of night
Hoping his truth would spark a light.

But morning came with a knock at the door
Boots and cuffs slammed him to the floor.
They bound his wrist... they dragged him out
“Traitor!” they screamed while neighbors stood about.
He turned his face to plead his case
But silence met him... a cold embrace.


Freedom of movement? “Stay in line!”
They mapped his steps controlled his time
A boy in chains... a life restrained
Each breath he took their leash remained
Once he wandered the hills and streams
Now his world was confined to dreams

Freedom to gather? “Disperse don’t dare!”
His friends were scattered like leaves in the air
They planned to protest to make a stand
But batons and teargas changed the plan
No banners waved no voices rose
Only silence where courage once chose

In the corner of a cell Ade sat still
A journalist punished for wielding his quill.
He wrote of farmers starved for grain
Of leaders fattened by others’ pain.
His words were truth his cause was just
But they turned his ink to chains of rust.

“Freedom to speak?” he thought in despair
“Not here not now not anywhere.”
The walls whispered back with a mocking tone
“You’re here because you stood alone.”

Then came Aisha... a mother of three
Whose freedom to live was no longer free.
Her daughters hungry her husband gone
She braved the streets to beg till dawn.
But laws had changed the streets weren’t safe
Her plea for mercy was met with hate.
“Move along you can’t be here!”
She clutched her child and hid her fear.

Thrown to the dirt
To the lowest apex
A nation’s soul reduced to reflex.
“Tame them!” they shout
Strip their will
Turn them into Mummies... something still.

And when all... is said and done
Who cares if they’re dead or gone
Their freedom to live to love to fight
All stolen beneath the cover of night.
Their screams are echoes lost in the haze
Drowned in silence forgotten in days.

But beneath the silence embers grow
A fire stoked by those who know
That even chains can’t bind the heart
And broken voices still have a part.

For Mide’s words will rise again
Aisha’s tears will spark the pen
Ade’s ink will flow with might
And their silence will roar into the night.

No freedom to speak no freedom to write
No freedom to live no freedom to fight.
But hear this now beneath their might
Even silence can ignite.

One day soon the tide will turn
And the flames of truth will brightly burn.
The people will rise their voices bold
Breaking the system that left them cold.