Monument for the Fallen

[...]

As we gather here we remember the Monuments

The Taj Mahal and the Pyramids

The thousands of the Unknown

who lost their hands, feet, their lives

to build the monuments of the city

We read in the Book of Acts Chapter 17,verse 23

that its was the Apostle Paul

who discovered the first monument to the Unknown

He chastised the citizens

how can you make a monument to an Unknown god?

When HE is Known to he who will Know

About a thousand and 19 hundred years later

in the occupied lands of America

the US State

in honour of their own god

the God of War

created a monument to the Unknown Soldier

This was not pagan but an act

of the State and Church

The Act of God

Ever since

even the leaders

of Communist and Nationalist Revolutions

occupied the city with Monuments

Monuments to Wealth, Power and Mystifications

Monuments to the Red Gods

Lenin and Mao

the Mythical Gods of Peace, Mahatma Gandhi and Nelson Mandela

And around these monuments

the people

we the people

are mobilised to sing

and dance

and wave flags of freedom

Today In the second decade

in the 2nd million

in a dark and unknown part of the city of Johannesburg

we resurrect the practice of the pagans

we celebrate the truly unknown gods

those in the city

who have fallen in the shadows of this city

Not in choice marble or 9 meter high bronze casting

But in a humble beer crate

Not in state parks or classy Shopping malls

not even in chic gentrified precincts

but in dark street corners

on pavements where people

daily risk losing their hard earn wage packets

limb and life

the streets of the city of gold

Johannesburg

We offer this Inscription:

The UnKnowne Cityzen

HERE RESTS One who fell in the dark end of this city street KNOWN BUT TO a grieving lover, child, parent A missing statistic in the planners book

A MOUNument Not cast in marble

Nor 9 meters of bronze

But A case of concrete Libated in beer

Eventhough Pause

Take a moment The fallen of this city

by Baptiste Marie