by BAR poet-in-residence Raymond Nat Turner
Since that November
Night in ’08, Negroz
Ain’t been straight…
On the Night Negroz lost their minds…
by BAR poet-in-residence Raymond Nat Turner
Perhaps it’s the crack
I smoked, the lines
I snorted, the ludes
I dropped, the shit
I shot, the rot gut
I gulped on the A
Train hurtling uptown
That’s agitating me—
Perhaps I’m dating
Myself—lubricant in
Right hand—fantasizing
About yesteryears
African- Americans walked
Vertical like asymmetrical
Street soldiers, sacred
In tens of thousands,
Instead of slithering on red,
White and blue bellies,
Like silly putty-headed
Bamboozled babies—
Their un-fused Fontanel lobes
Parker Bros. playthings…
I recall with horror
That November night
Negroz lost their minds
As if they’d had a huge
Hit of Goebbels shit!
Eyes wide, brains fried
Frostbitten feet, freeze-
Dried tears, hallucinating…
Since that November
Night in ’08, Negroz
Ain’t been straight…
Somethin’ spellbinding about
Smoke & mirror Mc Daddy
Hawkin’ worthless “Yes,
We can” buttons and
T-shirts, counterfeit change
In trillion dollar deals
For carriers, cluster
Bombs, Hellfire Missiles,
As world champion
Purveyor of violence
Something bewitching ‘bout
Bankster bailouts and
Being in back pockets
Of Fortune 500
Pharmaceutical and
Insurance companies—
Somethin’ intoxicating
About clean coal ties,
Pipeline binding, ALEC,
The brothers Koch and
Trade agreements off-
Shoring jobs Negroz need!
I’m mad at Negroz,
Yet LOVE Negroz MADLY
I pray they grow up
& come down with some
Adult politics…
The effectiveness of the social justice movement should be measured by “what material conditions have actually shifted for Black people” and other vulnerable groups, said Kovie Biakolo
Black people have nothing to show for a Biden presidency despite turning out in droves to put him in office.
One cannot logically support the liberation of Palestine while simultaneously advocating regime change in Syria and Venezuela and obscene funding for the US military.
US hostilities towards Ethiopia and Eritrea look more and more like those preceding US wars in Yugoslavia, Libya, and Syria, writes Ann Garrison.
At the 1972 event, Walter Rodney proclaimed that “black unity must be international because we live on every continent, through no choice of our own.”
