O Pinions!

2020 unmasked [159]

2020 unmasked

You with your fist raised to high-heaven,
singing praises of corrupt politicians,
treating themselves to roe-of-salmon,
eating their lobster on the finest linens!

Anger that comes from being a minion,
spitting and sputtering trumped-up opinions,
praying for the wrath of God's Dominion,
blaming 'others' for your own situation.

Never have you picked that thorny cotton.
Never do you put on masks of cotton.
What will you do when you face this dragon?
What will you say when your family's stricken?

Plead and pray for the dying children!
Visit your grandma before it's forbidden!
Wave goodbye with your plastic mittens!
Place silk flowers on the graves they'll lie in.

© Kåre Enga [177.159] (27.juli.2020)

For Round 75:

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Form for this round: Syair

The syair is a form of traditional poetry from the Malay-speaking world. The earliest examples come from the 1600s, authored by the Sumatran Sufi poet Hamzah Fansuri; he may well have been the inventor of the form.

Most syair are narrative poems, describing events, fictional, historical, or anecdotal. They may also be didactic, conveying ideas of religion or philosophy.

Often, they are not read silently; instead, performers sit before the audience with an open book and sing the verses aloud. The form may thus be said to straddle both oral and written literature.

Rules: A Syair is made up of stanzas of four lines of the same length, usually four or five beats. The rhyme scheme is AAAA.

Syair lines often begin with stressed syllables and end with unstressed rhyming syllables, e.g. “orang” is an acceptable rhyme for “wayang”; “button” is an acceptable rhyme for “melon”. This is by no means a rule; stress does not play a major role in the Malay language.

I can imagine performing this as a rap.

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