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
Declaration of Independence (for Donald "Duck" Bailey)
15 July 2026
Drummer men, drummer men, fluid loose-limbed rhythm-masters, were you born free?Did you drum? Did you drum? Did you drum
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— 

More Stories


  • BAR Book Forum: Kyla Schuller’s Book, “The Biopolitics of Feeling”
    Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
    BAR Book Forum: Kyla Schuller’s Book, “The Biopolitics of Feeling”
    15 Jul 2021
    The very physical category of femaleness was articulated by feminists and non-feminists alike as the sole property of whiteness in the 19th century,
  • Blackness and the Bomb
    Erica X Eisen
    Blackness and the Bomb
    15 Jul 2021
    Seventy years after the civil preparedness film Duck and Cover, it is long past time to reckon with the way white supremacy shaped U.S.
  • How History Textbooks Reflect America’s Refusal to Reckon with Slavery
    Cynthia Greenlee
    How History Textbooks Reflect America’s Refusal to Reckon with Slavery
    15 Jul 2021
    Textbooks are a battleground in which the humanity and status of black Americans are contested
  • How Amazon Exploited a Weakened America
    Sarah Leonard
    How Amazon Exploited a Weakened America
    15 Jul 2021
    Amazon will not stop squeezing every drop from workers until those workers have more power.
  • Swaziland Army in “Full Charge” After Protests, Many Killed by King’s Troops
    All Africa
    Swaziland Army in “Full Charge” After Protests, Many Killed by King’s Troops
    15 Jul 2021
    The Swazi military has reportedly warned the population to “obey instructions” or “face full wraith of troops.”
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us