by BAR poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner
As the farcial and nightmarish presidential contest winds into its final month, we try to make sense of the senseless, and point to the only avenue of possible salvation...
Only WE Can Save US…
by BAR poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner
If he farts before 6 it’s NEWS—
Trumping Standing Rock resistance,
Prison work stoppages nationwide,
Protests of police murders in Charlotte,
Tulsa, even football games—pro to
high school…
If she faints at 5 it’s NEWS—
If they ‘debate’
Resistance metastasizing like
Campaign lies—back to the back burner!
Every four-years,
Two years of
Dumbed-down,
Head-fixing, fear mongering sowing
Infantile illusions
Of bogeymen and women and
Mantras:
“Make us safe” “Save us”
Meditation pondering
Powerlessness…
We can do better
than planet-destroying parasites in
Pursuit of profits…
mystical market-driven men and
Women with mutilated imaginations
Who make bees and polar bears
disappear
We can do better
than poisoned water and
Poverty
We can do better
than porkers
Piggin’ out on pie charts
of our wealth for eternal war
We can do better
than worship violence—
Police state fundamentalism
Where, according to Old Testament,
they shoot ‘their own people’ and
Books become guns,
Traffic stops, CD sales… death sentences
We can do better
than stand-stolen-
Seminole-Sioux-Cheyenne ground with
concealed weapons on college campuses
We can do better
than prison-pipeline ‘schools’
Following money and blood
Crippling children’s spirits
We can do better
Taking to the streets,
Reservations, football fields, factories prisons—
universities where we teach ourselves to make
Revolution—taste paradise now—imagining
Socialist USA
Raymond Nat Turner © 2016 All Rights Reserved
BAR poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner is an acclaimed poet and performance artist. Find more of his work at http://upsurgejazz.com.
Dr. Gerald Horne is an author and historian who currently holds the John J. and Rebecca Moores Chair of History and African American Studies at the University of Houston.
Dr. Melina Abdullah is Director of Black Lives Matter Grassroots and Co-Founder of Black Lives Matter-Los Angeles. She is also a Professor of Pan-African Studies at California State University Los…
Dr. Kristen Budd is a Research Analyst with the Sentencing Project. She joins us from Washington to discuss their new report, “Increasing Public Safety by Restoring Voting Rights.” The report…
Margaret Kimberley was a guest on the Sputnik program, The Final Countdown, with hosts Ted Rall and Manila Chan. In this excerpt, she discusses the announcement of Joe Biden’s re-election campaign.
People in the U.S. venerate its violent history, support violence committed by the state, and remain very racist, yet express shock when individuals kill and maim.
