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

If The Shoe Fits...
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
05 Sep 2012
🖨️ Print Article

 

by Raymond Nat Turner

“In our marching shoes, yes, we can

Discover trails less traveled

Connecting us with sage spirits

Sampling James Brown with John

Brown”

 

If The Shoe Fits...

by Raymond Nat Turner

 

Shoe leather was once

Voting's egg, blood, its sperm...

Shoe's on the other foot, now

So, to vote, or not to vote

Is not the question---the

Commander even chided and

Derided us: Swap "bedroom

Slippers" for "marching shoes"

 

In our marching shoes, yes, we can

Click our heels like children

Catching burnt orange and ebony

Butterflies filled with freedom to fly

 

In our marching shoes, yes, we can

Conjure comets and name them

"Rebellion," "Underground," "Utopian,"

"Civil," "Survival" and celestial bodies coming...

 

In our marching shoes, yes, we can

Scale the Shangri-la where

Seventy-five year olds march like

Twenty-five year olds and

Twenty-five year olds orate like

Seventy-five year olds,shoulder

To shoulder striking, sitting-in,

Picketing, teaching and taking 

Care of one another on filaments

Of shoestring budgets...

 

In our marching shoes, yes, we can

Discover trails less traveled

Connecting us with sage spirits

Sampling James Brown with John

Brown, disturbing the universe, questioning

Everything about a corrupt, rotten pyramid

Scheme stitched together with tear gas,

Bullets, bombs and LIES...

 

In our marching shoes, blisters and all,

We're the ones we've been waiting for---

Cast Prada, Nike, Reebok ballots

At bought and bossed footmen!

Raymond Nat Turner can be contacted at Raymond (at) upsurgejazz.com.

(c) 2012 All rights Reserved

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


More Stories


  • Darius Edgerton
    Keep Those Dirty Gringo Paws Off Brazil!
    08 Apr 2026
    It’s up to Americans to stop the Trump administration from using U.S. power to strong‑arm Brazil and interfere in their elections.
  • Nicholas Mwangi
    A continental call from Africa: standing with Cuba against imperialist aggression
    08 Apr 2026
    With the economic strangulation of Cuba by the United States, African progressive organizations and movements are calling for broader continental solidarity.
  • Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
    Trump and U.S. Hubris Undid the Plan for Iran's Destruction
    08 Apr 2026
    The U.S. has been temporarily rattled in its regime change effort against Iran. Iranian resistance, hubris on the part of the U.S., and Donald Trump’s personal instability combined to undo a twisted…
  • Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist , ​​​​​​​ Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor and columnist
    The Twilight of Western White Power Will Usher in the Dawn of a New Global Civilization Without Systemic Degradation and Dehumanization
    08 Apr 2026
    A conversation focusing on U.S. actions against Iran explains why the imperialist drive for domination will actually lead to a superpower becoming much less powerful.
  • Editors, The Black Agenda Review
    ESSAY: Is the US Anti-Caribbean? How to overcome it then, Tim Hector, 1997
    08 Apr 2026
    “...it is like a knee-jerk reaction in the U.S – this consistent, insistent and persistent anti-Caribbean policy in the U.S. from 1776 to the present.”
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us