We only want peace
These words resonate through the land
Like a basketball dribbling left to right in the player’s hand
We only want peace
While some broken others unite
We only want peace
We only want peace
Reclaim the bits of life you can
But they took possession
I remember the ball just hanging there in the middle of the room
There was no gravity in our home when they came
The ball just hanging there
And what is a ball without a game
A game without a the player
A player without its people
a boy moving from city to city country to country all the while waiting for gravity to return
We only want peace
Waiting for the ball the finally drop
Unknowing of the fact it is our only hope
But we only want peace
These little pieces of Africa
We have held deeply
We only want peace
The little pieces of pieces of peace we can plaster together from the moments before those seconds before you break down the door and life becomes weightless
We want to gather those moments and treasure that peace
Lock it up in our prayers and send it as a refuge to other lands
Because ones like these ones aren’t safe ones
Floating, unstable and on the verge of corrupt
So we do send to lands where gravity means weightless
And the sky is no longer the limit
But somewhere along the line
Our prayers manifested into something even we could never have fathomed
It grew legs and arms and a heart, a strong Sudanese one
A face
A name
A will
And a want for peace.
An approximation of two million people were slaughtered in the second Sudanese civil war
They only wanted peace
An approximation of four million where displaced as a result of the second Sudanese civil war
We only wanted peace
Unfortunately there is no approximation for how many live with trauma in their hearts and the dead in their eyes but £3 a month should fix that
Only ever wanted peace
Unfortunately there is no approximation for how many those refugees converted to basketball Dribbled, dribbled, dribbled, their way to the NBA but I think we can name one
Nameless
These refugee boys stand
Lined up
They seem like lost causes
A basket ball ever yearning for a basket it doesn’t belong to
Shot down one by one
Country by country
Further and further away from home
They know what really matters
Not of only where you’re from of admiration overshadow in the hints of regret
But of where you going
Of whether you’ll be accepted
Whether you’ll be understood
Whether you’ll find peace
Shot down one by one
Over and over again but they still stand
They still stand
They still stand
Because they have a gut-wrenching soul-crushing hope that things will get better
We only want peace
We only want peace
We only ever wanted peace
‘Cause when it come down to it
When the battles cries have been sung
And the battle is said and done
But the aftermath creeps us on like African drums though the spine
When all those who fought come to unite
And celebrate their heroic plight
When all the basketball shots are made
And the refuge boys make their great escape
All we ever really wanted that ever mattered
Was that thing that use to resonate through the land
We only ever wanted peace
Will peace ever prevail?
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