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

…solidarity sounds like…
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
10 Apr 2019
🖨️ Print Article
movement
this is what solidarity looks like...

I’m a Seoul Man, da-da-da—dat-da-da-da
I’m a Seoul Man, da-da-da—dat-da-da-da
I’m also a Pyongyang, Managua, Manilla,
Teheran Man, too—As opposed to despot
As I am to coup!
When they go high—
Pole dancing palace and peacock throne—
I go low— on my own: grassroots, salt of the earth…
Lookin’ here and there, searchin’ everywhere
for bleach, Windex, Pine Sol scents—
janitors scrubbing toilets, mopping floors;
Lookin’ for blue plumes of forklift fumes—
pallets groaning in harmony with lunch
bucket language of warehouse workers;
Lookin’ for oily mist, machines birthing
stainless steel parts on shop floors;
Listenin’ for punch presses pounding parts
out for machine tools;
Listenin’ for squealing carts of library workers;
Listenin’ for intercoms ordering nurses to stations,
bells releasing teachers to lunch
Lookin’ to stand shoulder to shoulder
with—Workers of the World

I’m a Seoul Man, da-da-da—dat-da-da-da
I’m a Seoul Man, da-da-da—dat-da-da-da
I’m also a Pyongyang, Managua, Manilla,
Teheran Man, too—As opposed to despot
As I am to coup!
When they go high—
Pole dancing palace and peacock throne—
I go low— on my own: grassroots, salt of the earth…
Lookin’ here and there, searchin’ everywhere
Listenin’ for stiffening spine, rattling chain
leaping from guitars and marching to drums;
Lookin’ for ruby banners and fiery pens;
Lookin’ for actors; not dupes and dopes
dangling on dicks of dictators, kleptocrats,
torturers, Czars—like Negroz and liberals
dangled from The Drone Ranger…

© 2019. Raymond Nat Turner, The Town Crier. All Rights Reserved.

© 2019. Raymond Nat Turner, The Town Crier. All Rights Reserved.,br/> Raymond Nat Turner is an accomplished poet and performing artist. You can find much more of his work at http://upsurgejazz.com.

poetry

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


More Stories


  • Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
    The U.S. Determination to Achieve Full Spectrum Dominance is Not In Decline
    23 Sep 2026
    The trope of the United States being in a state of decline is a common one, but it should not be accepted without scrutiny. The U.S. faces crises but remains dangerous, powerful, and single-minded in…
  • Ajamu Baraka , BAR editor and columnist
    Waging War Against the People on Behalf of Capital: The Roots of U.S. Domestic Repression
    23 Sep 2026
    The "Antifa summit" and the NSPM-7 represent another institutional step toward consolidating fascism in the United States by criminalizing opposition to fascism itself.
  • Editors, The Black Agenda Review
    ESSAY: Open Letter to Marxists, Gwendolyn M. Patton, 1975
    23 Sep 2026
    “...the science for revolutionary change…is forged by human persuasion and building social consciousness based on the class analysis which sees the struggle against racism as central.”
  • Anthony Karefa Rogers-Wright
    The Symone Sanders Minstrel Show Demonstrates the Desolation of the Black Misleadership Class
    23 Sep 2026
    Symone Sanders interview with Hasan Piker exposed her as a bad-faith interlocutor who uses identity as a cudgel while remaining silent on the poverty, pollution, and police violence that plague the…
  • North-South Project for People(s)-Centered Human Rights
    Fergie Chambers Extradition: A People(s)-Centered Human Rights Analysis
    23 Sep 2026
    The U.S. extradition request for Fergie Chambers is an attempt to use Spanish courts to extend a domestic repression campaign against political opposition.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us