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

Anthem of Banksters & War Profiteers
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
07 Sep 2016
🖨️ Print Article

by BAR poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner

Why does San Francisco quarterback Colin Kaepernick choose to sit when the Star Spangled Banner is played before football games? Evidently he is one of many who know the real intention and import behind those bombs bursting in air...

Anthem of Banksters & War Profiteers…

by BAR poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner

“I spent most of my time being a high-class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism.”
—Marine General Smedley Butler at his retirement, 1933

I.

No Iroquois or Seminole National Anthem,

No Hawaiian or Mexican National Anthem,

Before bombers fly over stadiums schools and

social services were sacrificed for on altars of austerity;

No Ohlone or Navajo National Anthem,

No Iroquois or Seminole National Anthem,

No Hawaiian or Mexican National Anthem,

Before rockets red glare/bombs bursting in air

Over Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Bosnia, Libya,

Panama, Somalia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen…and

Others, soon to be announced…

II.

The bleeding baby with blown off arms and stumps for legs

Dies in a ‘surgically struck’ hospital while you drain kegs?

Commander’s quarterback, bloody band wrapping his wrist,

Running old red zone, war-profiteer plays from his kill list?

Are other peoples’ children ‘collateral damage expendable—

Like leftovers lost when your fridge became undependable?

Why’s the fight for ‘our freedom’ usually where there’s oil?

Why’s it where mineral wealth’s buried beneath foreign soil?

How about freedom fighting without tanks, planes and boats—

Freeing: Fitzgerald, Peltier, Gilbert, Bell, Jamal, Shoatz…?

Ain’t ‘Incarceration Nation’ Slave State, by its other name—

Ain’t it the darker side of a barbaric, brain-damaging game?

Black players: interception, sack, fumble, loss from N-word

Inches from lynching by the intoxicated mob, the racist herd—

Of Hitler-loving, hair-trigger thugs, masquerading as fans…

Always seconds away from true team colors of their klan’s!

Raymond Nat Turner Š 2016 All Rights Reserved
Raymond Nat Turner is an acclaimed poet and performance artist. Find more of his work at http://upsurgejazz.com.

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


More Stories


  • The old playbook
    BAR Poet-in-Residence Raymond Nat Turner
    The old playbook
    18 Dec 2019
    “The hatred of Tsarism was directed particularly against the Jews.
  • The Thick Blue Line: How the United States Became the World’s Police Force
    Patrick Blanchfield
    The Thick Blue Line: How the United States Became the World’s Police Force
    18 Dec 2019
    Many of the tools and tactics adopted by American police over the past half century were originally deployed to fight communism abroad.
  • BAR Book Forum: Eric Pritchard’s “Fashioning Lives”
    Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
    BAR Book Forum: Eric Pritchard’s “Fashioning Lives”
    18 Dec 2019
    Through writing, many Black queer people are creating the world we all deserve to live in.
  • Roberto Sirvent, "Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor (912)"
    Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
    BAR Book Forum: Peter Gelderloos’s “Worshiping Power”
    18 Dec 2019
    The anarchist author maintains that the only thing the state “is superior at is conquest.”
  • Democrats as “Liberal”? No, Neo-Liberal Capitulation
    Wilmer J. Leon III
    Democrats as “Liberal”? No, Neo-Liberal Capitulation
    18 Dec 2019
    Democratic leadership is pro-democracy in the US and opposed to it every place else in the world.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us