The rains have failed them again this year
And so hunger will stalk them no doubt
Yet another year of misery and death
This land so beset by drought

Forlornly they stare at the once fertile earth
That met their every need
Now parched and cracked like flaking skin
Where nothing grows, not even poison weed

From the unrelenting and merciless sun
With bony hands they shade eyes once proud
And scour the horizon from end to end
Praying for some life-giving cloud

Ears now deaf to the groaning throes
Of cattle dying untended in the dust
They sit and watch with lifeless eyes
The ploughs that have begun to rust

In the distance they see a cloud
And fleetingly think it’s bearing rain
It’s only the smoke of funeral pyres
Of bodies by hunger and thirst slain

Some tankers visit them now and then
But not many and not very often
Leading to bedlam, riots and chaos
Making fiends of peaceful men

Most often they just pass them by
To the cities that they will now seek
For villagers are those who do without
To inherit this earth you must be meek

They might as well have been adrift at sea
With water all around
With not a drop to quench their thirst
Despite the lapping sound

All round the village dust devils dance
Like so many evil spirits in glee
As people pack their meagre bundles
This frustrating destruction to flee

Swarms of locusts have descended now
Like those devils in the dust
To photograph these skeletons and write about
This story that’s a must

Will those elected by these very souls
Do something to stop this happening again
Implement schemes you draw on paper
To prevent this yearly refrain