The poetry of Mark Myrie

Think what you will of the man, but Mark 'Buju Banton' Myrie's body of creative work is deeply embedded in the history and culture of Jamaica. Since he first burst onto the music scene in the 1980s with his unmistakable raspy voice and hard-hitting, no-holds-barred brand of dancehall music, Buju has become one of the island's most recognisable figures, for the better or worse.

With his gritty musical expressions captured on his iconic Jamaican albums such as the aptly titled Voice of Jamaica and the smoother, reflective compositions of Til Shiloh, Buju has often brought voice to the collective thinking of many Jamaicans.

He became the face of Jamaica's often criticised stance on homosexuality with his controversial Boom Bye Bye and later spoke to the struggles and disenchantment of the poor man with songs like Not an Easy Road and Untold Stories.

soundtrack to life

Buju's music has become something of a soundtrack to everyday Jamaican life. So many of his songs are the kind you hear and immediately are brought back to a time and place in your life perhaps long passed.

His lyrics read like poetry, as good music often does, and with his recent conviction in a Florida court, many of the lines in his music seem to take on new, if not prophetic, meaning.

Here are a few of the more rhythmically poetic lines created by Mark Myrie over the years. See if in any of these lines, Buju has managed to represent your own experiences. The greatest poets often do.


Title: Give I Strength
Album: Inna Heights

'Indeed I see pestilence and plague

but Im not afraid

they are looking for what they can take

come in all size appear in all shape

Lord give us vision to differentiate

yeah they lay wait, we shall escape

God who protect is greater than great

in all that we do he holds our faith'

Title: Untold Stories
Album: Til Shiloh

'I'm living while I'm living to the father I will pray

Only him know how we get through every day

With all the hike in the price

Arm and leg we have fi pay

While our leaders play

All I see people a rip and a rob all a grab

teif neva love fi see teif wid long bag …

what is to stop the youths from get out a control

full up a education but nuh own a payroll

di clothes pan mi back have countless eye hole

ah could go on and on the full has never been told …

Who can afford to run will run but what about those who can't

they will have to stay

Opportunity a scarce, scarce commodity in dis time I say

When mama spend her last and send you go class

Neva you eva play

It's a competitive world for low budget people

Spending the dime while earning the nickel

with no regards for who it might tickle my cup is full to the brim.'

Title: 54/46 (Featuring Toots Hibbert)

'I've been incarcerated

Accused of crime

Placed in the bottomless pit to do my time

It was the grace

Of the most high, saviour divine

Yeah, I'm free of bondage

It's the everyday life of the underprivilege'.

Title: Deportee
Album: The Best of Buju Banton

'Boy get deport come dung inna one pants

Bruk an' have no money

but mi nuh response

No abiding city, wan pressure fi mi ranch

An' when 'im dey a foreign 'im did important

But 'im neva did a look back, neva did a glance

Neva know 'im would a tumble ova like an avalanche

Mama dung inna di hole, an' 'im don't buy her a lamp

Not a line, not a letter, nor a fifty cent stamp …

Waan drop inna di snow from about seventy-nine

Neva get di chance cause it wasn't my time

An' mi hear yuh dey a foreign an' commit di most crime

An' mek a bag a money when mi couldn't mek a dime.'

Title: Not An Easy Road
Album: Til Shiloh

'It's not an easy road

Many see the glamour and the glitter

And think a bed of rose

Who feels it knows

Lord help me sustain these blows

From the minute of birth you enter this earth

Obstacles inna you way to overcome first

Throughout every day they seem to get worse

Oh my God cast away this curse

Everybody a try fi make every end meet

Through any way that dem endeavour

Lord God you see it

No matter what the world may say out a street

Must have to survive, won't accept defeat

Now I'm weary, tired and dreary

Got no time to waste …

I've been travelling all morning

With such a heavy load

Now it's noon and I cannot afford

To put down my burden alongside the road

I've got to hold it.'

Title: Cry No More

'Don't cry, don't cry

Oh no, oh no

I never want to see you crying over me

You know that's not the way that it's supposed to be

Oh no, no no no no

You got to be strong

Never want to see you crying over me

You know that's not the way that it's supposed to be

Oh no, no no no no

You gotta be strong, oh my love

I know I've hurt you more than once

Treating your love like I don't response

Time indeed, caught up on me

Trapped in your tears

Please set me free I plea.'

Title: DestinyAlbum: Inna Heights

The rich man's wealth is in the city

Destruction of the poor is his poverty

Destruction of your soul is vanity

Do you hear

I and I, I wanna rule my destiny …

I've been blessed I've been touched

I love Jah so much

They keep fighting me I'm not giving up

May the realms of Zion fill my spiritual cup

Wisdom overstanding can never be too much

Give I protection day and night ...

Cast away their cords from us

you have them in the region in the valley of decision

Restraining the heathen with a rod of iron

you know not the destiny of a next man

Why hold him set him free too long …

My destination is homeward bound

Though force try to hold I down

Breaking chains has become the norm

I know I must get through no matter what a gwaan'.

Title: Not An Easy Road
Album: Til Shiloh

'It's not an easy road

Many see the glamour and the glitter

And think a bed of rose

Who feels it knows

Lord help me sustain these blows

From the minute of birth you enter this earth

Obstacles inna you way to overcome first

Throughout every day they seem to get worse

Oh my God cast away this curse

Everybody a try fi make every end meet

Through any way that dem endeavour

Lord God you see it

No matter what the world may say out a street

Must have to survive, won't accept defeat

Now I'm weary, tired and dreary

Got no time to waste …

I've been travelling all morning

With such a heavy load

Now it's noon and I cannot afford

To put down my burden alongside the road

I've got to hold it.' 

Title: Destiny
Album: Inna Heights

The rich man's wealth is in the city

Destruction of the poor is his poverty

Destruction of your soul is vanity

Do you hear

I and I, I wanna rule my destiny …

I've been blessed I've been touched

I love Jah so much

They keep fighting me I'm not giving up

May the realms of Zion fill my spiritual cup

Wisdom overstanding can never be too much

Give I protection day and night ...

Cast away their cords from us

you have them in the region in the valley of decision

Restraining the heathen with a rod of iron

you know not the destiny of a next man

Why hold him set him free too long …

My destination is homeward bound

Though force try to hold I down

Breaking chains has become the norm

I know I must get through no matter what a gwaan'. 

Title: Cry No More

'Don't cry, don't cry

Oh no, oh no

I never want to see you crying over me

You know that's not the way that it's supposed to be

Oh no, no no no no

You got to be strong

Never want to see you crying over me

You know that's not the way that it's supposed to be

Oh no, no no no no

You gotta be strong, oh my love

I know I've hurt you more than once

Treating your love like I don't response

Time indeed, caught up on me

Trapped in your tears

Please set me free I plea.'