Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire

Anthem of Banksters & War Profiteers
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
07 Sep 2016
🖨️ Print Article

by BAR poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner

Why does San Francisco quarterback Colin Kaepernick choose to sit when the Star Spangled Banner is played before football games? Evidently he is one of many who know the real intention and import behind those bombs bursting in air...

Anthem of Banksters & War Profiteers…

by BAR poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner

“I spent most of my time being a high-class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism.”
—Marine General Smedley Butler at his retirement, 1933

I.

No Iroquois or Seminole National Anthem,

No Hawaiian or Mexican National Anthem,

Before bombers fly over stadiums schools and

social services were sacrificed for on altars of austerity;

No Ohlone or Navajo National Anthem,

No Iroquois or Seminole National Anthem,

No Hawaiian or Mexican National Anthem,

Before rockets red glare/bombs bursting in air

Over Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Bosnia, Libya,

Panama, Somalia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen…and

Others, soon to be announced…

II.

The bleeding baby with blown off arms and stumps for legs

Dies in a ‘surgically struck’ hospital while you drain kegs?

Commander’s quarterback, bloody band wrapping his wrist,

Running old red zone, war-profiteer plays from his kill list?

Are other peoples’ children ‘collateral damage expendable—

Like leftovers lost when your fridge became undependable?

Why’s the fight for ‘our freedom’ usually where there’s oil?

Why’s it where mineral wealth’s buried beneath foreign soil?

How about freedom fighting without tanks, planes and boats—

Freeing: Fitzgerald, Peltier, Gilbert, Bell, Jamal, Shoatz…?

Ain’t ‘Incarceration Nation’ Slave State, by its other name—

Ain’t it the darker side of a barbaric, brain-damaging game?

Black players: interception, sack, fumble, loss from N-word

Inches from lynching by the intoxicated mob, the racist herd—

Of Hitler-loving, hair-trigger thugs, masquerading as fans…

Always seconds away from true team colors of their klan’s!

Raymond Nat Turner © 2016 All Rights Reserved
Raymond Nat Turner is an acclaimed poet and performance artist. Find more of his work at http://upsurgejazz.com.

Do you need and appreciate Black Agenda Report articles? Please click on the DONATE icon, and help us out, if you can.


More Stories


  • US Decision-makers Cannot Handle End of White Supremacy: Former Vice Presidential Candidate
    ​​​​​​​ Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor and columnist
    US Decision-makers Cannot Handle End of White Supremacy: Former Vice Presidential Candidate
    31 Aug 2022
    Dangerous and irrational U.S. foreign policy decisions are driven by fear of the end of white world supremacy and the determination to follow the principles of full spectrum dominance. Ajamu Baraka…
  • Liberal Requiem for the Cold War
    Kahlil Wall-Johnson
    Liberal Requiem for the Cold War
    31 Aug 2022
    The U.S. loss of unipolar power has created liberal angst which does little to foster understanding of the new multipolar world.
  • EDITORIAL: Haiti Under the Rule of the United States, Dantès Bellegarde, 1927
    Editors, The Black Agenda Review
    EDITORIAL: Haiti Under the Rule of the United States, Dantès Bellegarde, 1927
    31 Aug 2022
    Dantès Bellegarde’s 1927 editorial on the US occupation of Haiti speaks to the present.
  • Africans Take UK to Court Over Abuses Committed During Colonial Era
    Al Mayadeen
    Africans Take UK to Court Over Abuses Committed During Colonial Era
    31 Aug 2022
    Kenyan activists are suing the United Kingdom for its grave abuses during the country’s colonial era after London refused to take any accountability for its crimes.
  • Governor Woke Smoke’s $campaign
    Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
    Governor Woke Smoke’s $campaign
    31 Aug 2022
                                                           …
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us