Jai+D



Patience, by Damian Marley featuring Nas.Distant Relatives album, 2011

**Patience is one of the most meaningful songs I’ve heard in a long time.**

The main reason why I chose this song is because of its powerful lyrics, which strongly criticise the many flaws of society. As the song is a rap, it has more verses than many other songs, in this case 15 of them and 4 choruses. The fact that it uses an ancient African chant as a chorus also attracted me, as that makes it different from other songs with stupid, sing along choruses.

It uses a very basic level of English, so that the song can be understood by everyone. It doesn’t use typical instruments or computer generated sounds, instead using the panpipes and v ocals to create the harmony.

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** So what do the lyrics say? **

The objective of this song is to show the many flaws that our current society presents, heavily criticising the nature of man and of how we are spiralling into chaos. It talks about how centric money has become in today’s society and how the phrase “Every man is born equal” holds no meaning any more.

It also criticises the fact that the youth is given no importance, n they have no say in anything, even though they hold the future of the world in their hands. He even says that they are treated worse than the animals that are kept in the zoo, for the sole reason that the animals generate income and the youth does not.

It goes on to compare the state of the world to a “monster” or “beast” which is in constant growth, and how if we let it keep growing there will reach a point where we will not have the luxury of ignoring it, as it will “catch” all of us.

As soon as the second chorus ends, it speaks directly to the listener, asking the rhetorical quetion of “Do we actually learn useful things in our life or are we just corrupted from the start?”, which really makes the listener sit back and reflect upon his life, and wonder if this holds any truth for his or her own life.

Soon after, when the third chorus ends, it criticises how we are destroying our planet and all its resources, even though we know they are waning. The use of words to describe his phenomenon “consumin', eatin', deletin', ruin” give off a strong feeling of finality and of impending doom.

In conclusion, we are left with the feeling that there is a problem and we are doing nothing to solve it. We haven’t yet reached the point of no return, but we are fast approaching and still we stay idle. And it is not only one problem, it is an accumulation of many problems, which makes it the situation all the more precarious.

**When I listen to this song, I am reminded of this image:**



It reminds me that the future of the world is in our hand, and that we are causing all the problems. So instead of moaning and complaining, we should stand up and and make things change if we aren't happy with them. It also tells me that instead of lifting the world up to new heights, we are letting it slip through our fingers, and once it falls there is no going back.

It also shows how fragile the world is, and how we are disrupting its balance with wars, ruthlessness to make money and the destruction of its limited resources. We must either change now, or it will be too late for all of us.