Self-Rule is Not Rocket Science

The shadow of the past still lingers here,
A waiting game, a silent fear.
We sit and watch for change to come,
For roads repaired and tasks undone.

Colonial chains shaped our way,
Taught us to sit, not seize the day.
But waiting never brings the dawn,
And in our patience, hope is gone.

A dream deferred, a bitter trance,
Freedom lost in circumstance.
But self-rule's not some distant star;
It's who we are, not what we are.

For sixty years, the youth have bled,
Their futures dimmed, their spirits led
Into a maze of lost intent,
Where strength is spent, and hope is bent.

The system's roots, so deep they grow,
Colonial ghosts we barely know.
They haunt our halls, they guide our hands,
And bind our minds with unseen strands.

It's time to shake off fear's disguise,
And let the truth before us rise:
To self-rule is to simply be
Ourselves, in full autonomy.

A natural gift, not bought or sold,
Not measured by a crown or gold.
The law we write, we must obey,
To guide our lives in our own way.

Why seek the masters of the past,
Whose iron grip held us so fast,
When in our hearts and in our lands
The power to rule still firmly stands?

Do it yourself, stand up, reclaim,
Take charge of life, in your own name.
Responsibility, the call,
To rise, to answer, one and all.

Long live the souls who self-rule free,
Who write their own fate, destiny.
From every hill and vale and plain,
Let self-rule rise, let freedom reign!

— Wanaku Verdzekov