by BAR poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner
Word is that president-elect Donald Trump still has performance openings for next week's inaugural. In the selfless and noble spirit of public service, our poet kindly offers his own services, and anxiously awaits a response from Rump tower.
A Poet's Proposal for DT's Inauguration
by BAR poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner
Bet you wonderinâ how I knew
Few are willinâ to perform for you?
I heard it through the grapevine
Also on TV, radio and onlineâŚ
I ainât A-listâ
F-list, maybe?
Not a seven-figga n**** or War House Hoet in the
Retinue the Drone Ranger plays like plastic kazoosâ
Yet, Iâm willing to serve, sir:
Call it Patriot Act III!
Willing to audition, practice, rehearseâgratisâ
get on the back of a Greyhound bus, brown bag,
greasy fried chicken, like the good olâ daysâŚ
Apply a plastic smile, applaud on cue, shuffle, shake hands with
Strong-arm Williams, Sheriff Stephen Judas Clarke, Thom-ass
Clarence, and other warlike Bassackwards Tribal leaders
Iâm willing to get William Withers with you, sir:
Itâs my appointed duty
To let you use me
Get me in a crowd of right-wing racists and act real rude to meâ
âCause I wanna spread the news:
That if it trends this good gettinâ used
Come on, use me âtil you use me upâ
My fifteen-minutes of FLAME!!
Raymond Nat Turner is an acclaimed poet and performance artist. Find more of his work at http://upsurgejazz.com.
This week the New Cold War and political prisoners were on your mind.
MOVEâs history is a reminder why police and prison abolition remain so urgent.
Blackness is understood as always already criminal, and homonormative imagination is no different in this respect.
The temporal-spatial convergence of the largest white city in amerikka, with the most persistent "BLM" protests and exceedingly white subcultures should not be dismissed as coincidence.
âNo excusesâ teaching borrows from the âbroken windowsâ theory of policing, which has been enacted in U.S. cities since the mid-1980s.
