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 US Dictatorship of (White) Capital and its Tools of Bamboozlement 
    Glen Ford, BAR Executive Editor
    The US Dictatorship of (White) Capital and its Tools of Bamboozlement 
    24 Sep 2020
    The New York Times and fellow corporate media discourage Americans from organizing against the rule of the rich by pretending that People Power is a fantasy. 
  • Freedom Rider: The Democrats’ Supreme Failure
    Margaret Kimberley, BAR senior columnist
    Freedom Rider: The Democrats’ Supreme Failure
    23 Sep 2020
    The corporate Democrats refuse to back measures that appeal to huge majorities of their base, preferring instead to campaign against one evil man and his appointees.
  • Biden and the Democrats Have No Plan to Stop the Bleeding—at Home or Abroad
    Danny Haiphong, BAR Contributing Editor
    .Biden and the Democrats Have No Plan to Stop the Bleeding—at Home or Abroad
    23 Sep 2020
    The Democrats say they’re running against the most “dangerous president in modern American history,” but Joe Biden has no prescription for resolving any of the crises facing Black and working class
  • Demilitarizing the NFL
    Ann Garrison, BAR Contributing Editor
    Demilitarizing the NFL
    23 Sep 2020
    Nation Magazine sportswriter Dave Zirin, speaking to Ann Garrison, says that militarism is a founding feature of American football, not just a bug, but we don’t have to accept it in f
  • OK to say the F-word?
    Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
    OK to say the F-word?
    23 Sep 2020
    P.O.E.T. are the only letters behind my name— So you scowl; scold; spank my hands with rulers and switches worn smooth from serial beatdowns, dare I use the F-word…
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us