Hard Lesson

Half a million spectacles

Packed up in a warehouse

Bales of human hair

Carefully categorised

In length and colours

Brushes for hair, nails and shoes

mouthless gold teeth

The bald truth

Of state oppression

Organised

Co-ordinated

An inventory of repression

Change the place

Change the time

Uganda, Bosnia

Cambodia, Rwanda

Zimbabwe, Vietnam, Afghanistan

Somalia, Libya, Palestine

Iran, Iraq and Lebanon,

El Salvador, Nicaragua

The balance sheet,

The public image

Oil revenue, minerals

Political expediency

Diplomacy,

The language of convenience

Immigration was once known

As labour migration

War is for power

Power’s for control

what you eat

what you think

what you pray

how you vote

A record was made

that’s never been shown

of the horror of Holocaust

unless you sat

through the trials at Nuremberg

Don’t show it, they said

it’s not the right time

to change public opinion

to feel sorry for Jews

refugees from their homelands

no room at our Inns for them

Give them some time

until they come around

and learn to tyrannise

a hard lesson taught.