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

if it takes 100 years
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
06 Dec 2017
🖨️ Print Article
if it takes 100 years

I am the North Star—
Hope; Never wavering, organizing,
burning thorough bars, walls, wire—
I am consciousness of all
creatures, crystalline water,
clean, sweet air, black soil
From forgotten reservations

I am non-GMO, organic apples,
pears, lettuce, tomatoes, spinach
Springing from beads of sweat
mixed with midnight oil—
I am not the latest sneakers, phones
from Black Friday Madness,
Celebrity Worship or
Dumbed-down gossip ‘bout ‘stars’

I am coagulated blood
of gunned down doctors wafting from
Women’s reproductive rights—
Flowering from fertilizer of guilt
I am freedom, loving
Whomever I choose…

I am single-payer
Healthcare rising from Big Pharma
body-slams/lies of lobotomized politicians;
I am affordable housing
clubbed from corrugated cardboard sleep;
I am free education—
Peace studies writhing free of
handcuffs, cutting off circulation…
I am smoldering ashes of a
burned down Black Baptist Church
Repudiating ‘race’ with pain

I am revolution—
Socialism passing freely, back and forth
between metal detectors/bomb-sniffing dogs—
Arriving just moments ago:
…Having been here forever…

Raymond Nat Turner © 2017 All Rights Reserved
Raymond Nat Turner is an acclaimed poet and performing artist. 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


  • Editors, The Black Agenda Review
    EXCERPT: Die Nigger, Die! H. Rap Brown, 1969
    26 Nov 2025
    “Blackness alone is not revolutionary.”
  • Ann Garrison, BAR Contributing Editor
    The United Arab Emirates Use a Black Sport to Whitewash a Genocide in Africa
    26 Nov 2025
    National Basketball Association (NBA) players are 70-75% Black, so the game is commonly referred to as “a Black sport.” Now the United Arab Emirates are using it to whitewash a genocide in Africa.
  • Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
    Blues for belligerent blonde Lil Eva Braun
    26 Nov 2025
    "Blues for belligerent blonde Lil Eva Braun" is the latest from BAR's Poet-in-Residence.
  • Black Alliance For Peace
    Imam Jamil Al-Amin, Presente!
    26 Nov 2025
    From the front lines of the Black Power movement to a Georgia prison cell, the life of Imam Jamil Al-Amin represents a continuous thread of resistance and the state's relentless retaliation against…
  • Jon Jeter
    Unable to Squeeze Another Dime From Black People, a Subprime Economy Runs Aground
    26 Nov 2025
    America's financial overlords are hooked on a subprime lending model that preys on the poor, and now this unsustainable system is crashing down.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us