Monday, June 27, 2011

Metaphor of the Day

From Peter Gabriel's excellent song, Biko.

The subject matter is the death of anti-apartheid activist Steve Biko, beaten to death by South African police.
"You can blow out a candle,
But you can't blow out a fire.
Once the flame begins to catch,
The wind will blow it higher."
A wonderful metaphor. And he was right, of course.

Sadly the removal of apartheid didn't turn out to herald a panacea for South Africa. But it's probably asking a bit much of a single metaphor to capture that too, so good work Peter Gabriel.

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