South Africa, ICJ, genocide, humanity, poem, poetry

TUXEDO

tuxedo
is name of
the game

you file your suit
hoping
to agree
of definitions

promise not to fight
over whether
this or that
homonym
accidental or
intended

all puns here
quite intended

but here they all are
creatures
of the South
my fellow-travellers

fat portfolio in their satchels
speaking in each codicil
humanity out loud

arguing
that a single sluk of
this evil
can
erase angelic face
pollute the God-given concept
of eternal, outright righteous

hold mirror up to Emperor
to deconstruct
all mind of god

yes
a time when
courage must be superhuman
to vouch for
civility, decency

to put us on the spectrum of
one indivisible being

and this to argue
before history, in
tuxedo

lest the lie, the quite lie
the brutal lie, the truth
denying
crushing line

find its path to become supreme