Hail, great defender of freedom,
Patroller of souls without cease,
Worldwide dispenser of justice;
Hail, mighty warrior of peace.
Tireless opponent of torture,
Bringer of freedom from fear,
Fear of the tools of the tyrant;
The ones that you sold him last year.Dealing out death from a distance;
Ruling by smart bomb and drone;
Choosing the lives to be taken;
Protecting the lives of your own.
Teaching democracy’s details,
That we are the ones who know best,
Showing these primitive peoples
The way that we live in the west;A life lit by Liberty’s beacon;
But isn’t it odd, in a way,
That justice and freedom from torture
depends on Guantanamo Bay?
Some say that truth is a treason,
And freedom a complex affair
Threatened for God knows what reason
By God knows who, kept God knows where.Truth’s locked away and forgotten
And the gaoler’s mislaid the key;
And freedom’s safely imprisoned
Far away in the land of the free.
Here’s justice; detained without trial
In a land that lives outside the law;
America; merely the madman
That no one believes any more.
Les Barker
See also Ffagl Rhyddid (Welsh translation)
by Les Barker