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

A war is not a war…
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
23 Mar 2022
🖨️ Print Article
A war is not a war…
Vietnam in 1969. (Photograph: Netflix/Rex/Shutterstock)

                                                                                             A war is not a war…  

                                                                                     “Truth is the first casualty of war”  

                                                                                               —Phillip Snowden

 

Somewhere there’s bombing—

not where you are…

Somewhere there’s bombing—

maybe Kandahar?

Somewhere skies rain artillery shells nonstop. Night

and day—Day and night… Twisted, tortured rebar

bones of high-rises surrender as pulverized

prisoners…Windows,

doors and floors are crushed with concrete dust and

debris on rubble-strewn streets—Slippery with

blood, brain and guts— Near scorched, Swiss-cheese

cars…

Somewhere there’s shelling—

not where you are…

Somewhere there’s shelling—

maybe Côte d’Ivoire?

Somewhere haunting wailing and moaning punctuates

puzzles under shells of burnt-out buildings. Do empty

shoes and sandals—limbless torsos, decapitated bodies—

offer clues to where it is? Does viscosity of the blood in

form us? What about bloody blankets, the bent blue bike,

Books and papers?

Is it Palestine? Yemen? Ukraine? Is it Tripoli, Kabul or

Baghdad? Addis Ababa or Aleppo? Any tips from the

rhythms and inflections of cries? Do rattling wheels of

Refugee luggage offer a clue?

Somewhere there’s killing—

not where you are

Somewhere there’s killing—

maybe Myanmar?

Call it an operation—non-invasive outpatient procedure—

Call unscheduled surgeries medical mishaps. Leave amputees

and decapitated patients for loved ones to mourn and the mass

Gravediggers to bury…

Address Orwellian medicine men as Dr. Goebbels as they put

patients on low-calorie diets of unknown knowns and known

Unknowns…

Call pre-op scrubbing the airwaves of “Blowin’ In The Wind,”

“Peace Train,” “Imagine” infection control. Then declare:

“The Friendship Train’ ain’t runnin’—You’re either with us,

or you’re with the enemy—and truth will get you 15—instead

of setting you free…”

A war is not a war—

It’s a Special Military Operation. Land Mass Amputation.

It’s Manifest Destiny. It’s a Desert Shield; a Desert Storm

for Enduring Freedom during Q2 through

Q4. And it’s not personal—it’s Business…

Our Saturday marches plant tiny seeds—small

stubborn possibilities. May we learn to cast our

lots with lunch bucket crowds. Remember the

Essential ones? The ones who one day will say:

“Enough! We, too, are ILWU Local 10—We refuse

to lend magic of our hands to merchants of death! We

refuse to load and unload WMD!” And could that day

be the day body-armored workers join in; turning tools with triggers on grifter generals/blood-lusting

bosses?

© 2022. Raymond Nat Turner, The Town Crier. All Rights Reserved.

Former forklift driver/warehouse worker/janitor, 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: https://www.gofundme.com/f/the-town-criers-big-tooth-fund PayPal: paypal.me/towncrierRNT

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


More Stories


  • Jacqueline Luqman
    Continuity of Social Control From Slave Patrols To Policing To ICE
    28 Jan 2026
    To understand the violence of contemporary immigration enforcement, one must trace its lineage directly to the antebellum slave patrols — a system founded on racial terror and complete state control.
  • Aby L. Sène
    Patagonia Forest Fires Reveal Imperialist Theft of Protected Lands
    28 Jan 2026
    The arson attacks that engulfed the protected forests of he Andean-Patagonia region serve as a reminder that Western conservation models, which dispossess Indigenous peoples of their lands, are…
  • Anthony Karefa Rogers-Wright
    Trump Derangement Syndrome Is Real, And It Obfuscates the Requisite Question of Self-Determination in the Heart of U.S. Empire
    28 Jan 2026
    When political energy is channeled into opposing an individual, that energy is diverted from the work of building the popular power needed to challenge the empire he represents.
  • Hanna Eid
    Iran and the Strategy of Tension
    28 Jan 2026
    The Cold War-era "strategy of tension" has evolved into a modern system of hybrid warfare targeting sovereign nations that challenge Western hegemony.
  • Julia Wright
    The Photos of a Five Year Old ICE Terror Doesn't Want Us to See
    28 Jan 2026
    The arrest of a five-year-old captured public attention and ignited a prisoner revolt inside a U.S. ICE detention center. Powerful imagery is a useful tool for the people, but dangerous in the hands…
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us