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

Dis-honest Broker
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
01 May 2024
🖨️ Print Article
UpSurgeNYC

"Dis-honest Broker" is the latest from BAR's Poet-in-Residence, recently performed at UpSurge!NYC at Sister's Bookstore in Harlem, NY. The show was a celebration of National Poetry and Jazz Appreciation Month.

Metallic music of shovels; Abrasions again on bare hands
Digging, digging, digging through twisted bones and
busted bricks of buildings. To backpacks, blankets, baby
body parts to rescue tiny arms and legs emitting whispers…

Obese bulldozers munching homes and olive trees;
Settlers snacking on bones of the evicted.
Aquifer flooded with sea water and sewage are now G-
Rated nightmares; And matter not to NFL, NBA bi-partisans

Forked tongue, Dis-honest broker, 
fluent in the ancient language of
Genocide 
Trots out tattered tropes for terror. Swears another Offal Office
oath on War House Bible—bathed in blood of 10s of millions—
Trail of Tears to Wounded Knee; Tulsa to Hiroshima; Korea to
Vietnam to Afghanistan…

Riddler/Joker—Dis-honest broker:
“You have a right to…” 
Be an aircraft carrier on the desert
Acting as a weapons lab conducting
Trade shows; Disguised as democracy
Acting as apartheid state; Concealing
Third Reich real estate practices—Go on
Step on the gas—and “Mow the grass!”

“You have a right to…” Quell them/Shell them!
Bombard them/Boneyard them!
Snipe them/Wipe them! Un-home them/Pogrom them!
Expel them/Farewell them!

“You have a right to…” Strangulate them/Annihilate them!
Bomb roads they’re instructed to travel— And let them all
Eat hot lead and gravel!

“You have a right to…” Kill them one-a-day… for years—
Daily… for decades… Until bloody bootprints become
Normal as “Ironclad!!!!”             Normal as Baghdad??

“You have a right to…” 22 days of carnage; provided
you Madison Avenue it: “Operation Caste-Lead!!!!”
“You have a right to…” Step on the gas—and
“Mow the grass!“

“You have a right to…” 51 days of slaughter—
just market it as: “Operation Protective Edge!!!!”
“You have a right to…” Step on the gas—and
“Mow the grass!”

“You have a right to…” Dr. Goebbels’ white phosphorus
prescriptions for human animals holding human shields;
Holding hostages; Holding hospital hideouts; Holding
House keys—for…                          3/4 of a Century…

© 2023. Raymond Nat Turner, The Town Crier. All Rights Reserved.

Raymond Nat Turner is a NYC poet; BAR's Poet-in-Residence; and founder/co-leader of the jazz-poetry ensemble UpSurge!NYC. You can Vote for his work at GoFundMe and PayPal.

poetry
Jazz
Harlem

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


Related Stories

Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
Army of Artists (For My Friend Horace Silver)
17 December 2025
Harmony of a hug,Rhythm of a rose,Melody in the mirror
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
MrJoeSam’s Text Messages
12 June 2024
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR’s poet-in-residence, pays homage to San Francisco’s shipyard artist JoeSam who died peacefully on June 1, 2024, surroun
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
Raymond Nat Turner at the UpSurge Jazz Celebration
03 April 2024
 
JoeSam art
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
MrJoeSam’s Text Messages
24 January 2024
MrJoeSam’s Text Messages
Image of Refaat Alareer sitting in a crowd of graduates
Editors, The Black Agenda Review
POEM: If I Must Die, Refaat Alareer, 2023
13 December 2023
Palestinian poet Refaat Alareer, a martyr of zionist state genocidal violence, has left us with a tale of resistance and hope.
a few flock notes for jaimie breezy branch
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
a few flock notes for jaimie breezy branch
07 September 2022
a few flock notes for jaimie breezy branch “The artist must elect to fight for Freedom or for Slavery” —Paul Robeson
Reese Piece…
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
Reese Piece…
15 April 2021
Salute to City of Angels’ son! He wrote, he wrote, he wrote And he wrote… Ramparts, The Progressive, The
First 100 Daze: A ‘new’ dance craze
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
First 100 Daze: A ‘new’ dance craze
27 January 2021
Everybody’s wild ‘bout this ‘new’ dance craze— this lewd, crude dance called “The 1st 100 Daze…”
mashing the state— Kristallnacht-style
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
mashing the state— Kristallnacht-style
20 January 2021
Kristallnacht came casting lead ballots, overthrowing Black elected officials and Massacring those that VOTED for them— 
This is what hypocrisy looks like…
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
This is what hypocrisy looks like…
13 January 2021
“It's like writing history with lightning.“ — Woodrow Wilson on Birth of A Nation

More Stories


  • Rob Grams
    New Caledonia: Kanak Revolt Against French Colonialism
    22 May 2024
    To understand the current uprisings in New Caledonia, one must look back at the history of colonization and violent repression of the islands by France.
  • Abayomi Azikiwe
    African Liberation Day and the Struggle for Freedom in Palestine
    22 May 2024
    There is a close connection between the Pan-Africanist Movement and the current struggle to end the genocide in Gaza
  • BAP Atlanta
    ATL to GAZA: Free Palestine and Stop Cop Cities
    22 May 2024
    The violence unleashed by Zionism and US imperialism can only be combated through mass organized political activity united in a commitment to toppling these forces.
  • Illustration of Jean-Jacques Dessalines
    Jemima Pierre, BAR Editor and Contributor
    How The West Underdeveloped Haiti
    22 May 2024
    What are the roots of Haiti’s prolonged crisis? Haitian-American scholar Jemima Pierre takes us through the history of how the West underdeveloped the country, from French colonial looting and debt…
  • Black Agenda Radio
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    Black Agenda Radio May 17, 2024
    17 May 2024
    This week we discuss a lawsuit that seeks to force New York City to end patterns of segregation in its public school system.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us