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

Build Back Better Street Heat- Shoe Leather Legislators-Pavement Policymakers
BAR Poet-in-Residence Raymond Nat Turner
10 Nov 2021
🖨️ Print Article
Build Back Better Street Heat- Shoe Leather Legislators-Pavement Policymakers
Build Back Better Street Heat- Shoe Leather Legislators-Pavement Policymakers

CODE RED!!

 

Calling all street heat—shoe leather legislators— 

Calling all pavement policymakers bored by the bigtop:

clean coal clowns; fossil fools; net zero acrobats; carbon

jugglers…Bored by greasy-thumbed grifters and jingoist 

gangsters; Bored by junk metal-chested generals disguised 

as donkeys inside elephants—Tethered to tits on Wall Street’s 

bull… Blocking! Stalling! Gaslighting! Waging war by other names…

 

Calling all street heat—shoe leather legislators— 

Calling all pavement policymakers bored by the bigtop:

tired of 2/4 Dancers dancing the Limbo from bended knees;

Tired of them spinning spineless legislation swaddled in

rectangular rags—reaching across their arid aisle and

Externalizing excrement. Leaving dung-splattered streets to

3 monkeys who See No Oil; Hear No Coal; Speak of No Gas as evil…

 

Calling all street heat—shoe leather legislators— 

Calling all pavement policymakers… Who’ll stop 

the circus from sullying our names with climate 

crime? Who’ll say their names—their Wall Street 

gang names—reconnecting them to climate crimes?

Who’ll say Superstorm Chevron?

Nor’ easter Exxon; Tsunami Shell?

And who’ll say Blackened bird BP?

 

Calling all street heat—shoe leather legislators— 

Calling all pavement policymakers who may—or

may not—remember the Arab Spring; Remember Occupy

lingo “1%”/“99%.” Remember knitted brows; Remember  

putting forehead to problems

created by person Hoods—aka corporate kings and queens…

 

Calling all street heat—shoe leather legislators— 

Calling all pavement policymakers recall rubber 

bullet, plastic cuff, bloody, broken bone, stolen eyeball- 

tooth trauma…Recall draconian sentences required to

arrest killer cops; wrench slavers statues from pedestals; 

Rechristen schools, streets, parks, plazas, teams; Retire 

Unca Ben, Aunt Jemima with stars and bars at NASCAR

Calling all street heat—shoe leather legislators—

and scholars 

 

Calling all pavement policymakers—and professors…

Study resistance. Major in mass action. Your gait, your

posture’s perfect—like ours once were— 

Matriculate 2020-like. And defend dissertations entitled:

“Fossil Fuels, Force and Deception of The Corporate State—

University Of The Streets…”

 

© 2021. Raymond Nat Turner, The Town Crier. All Rights Reserved.  

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


More Stories


  • Benin Armed Forces
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    Coup Attempt in Benin and Neo-Colonialism in West Africa
    12 Dec 2025
    Abayomi Azikiwe, Editor of Pan-African Newswire, joins us from Detroit to discuss the recent coup attempt in the West African nation of Benin. The coup ended with assistance from neighboring Nigeria…
  • Press conference
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    Press Conference Challenging Trump's Venezuela No Fly Zone
    12 Dec 2025
    The Peoples Assembly for Peace and Sovereignty of Our Americas convened in Venezuela, but many delegates were unable to attend due to the Trump administration declaring a no-fly zone. The Workers…
  • Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
    We Are All Somalia
    10 Dec 2025
    Donald Trump’s anti-Somali rants are not directed solely at members of that group. All Black/African people are seen as suspects, as ungrateful criminals who are deserving of punishment and scorn.…
  • ​​​​​​​ Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor and columnist
    Lifting the Veil on International Human Rights Day: How Gaza Exposed the Oxymoron of Western Values and Human Rights
    10 Dec 2025
    The genocide in Gaza has torn off the West’s human rights mask. This naked colonial violence demands a new path where rights are won through people's struggle, not granted by the very states that…
  • Editors, The Black Agenda Review
    INTERVIEW: “We have to be together to withstand the fury of this wounded beast…” Shirley Graham Du Bois, 1975
    10 Dec 2025
    “...the point was to come together to stand against the common enemy. And this is the lesson that I hope we learn…”
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us