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

Archaic capitalism’s COVID cops?
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
13 May 2020
🖨️ Print Article
Archaic capitalism’s COVID cops?
Archaic capitalism’s COVID cops?

What if COVID-19 came and
drove down crime by 40%?
What if capitalism’s cops be-
came useless 

patchwork quilts of punitive
policing—cruel citations and 
fines? Stagecoach drivers in 
Tesla times? Milk pails beneath
bulls on the Sahara Desert?

What if we found we could live 
Life 
without gifts of nips/‘roid rage?
Hatred, anger, fear, cortisol and 
adrenaline…
Which go on giving… in immune
system stressed times we tread?

What if there was no need for
their weekly vignettes of
Violence on videos going viral?

What if we abolished abuse as
absurd as—lies as ludicrous as:
I shot you because
you had no mask on
I shot you because
you had a mask on
I shot you because
you weren’t physically-distancing
I shot you because
you were physically-distancing 
I shot you because you coughed
I shot you because you sneezed
I shot you because you tested positive
I shot you because you tested negative
I shot you because you were untested
I shot you because we’re in it together
I shot you because I heard immunity—
and it sounded like herd impunity…???

© 2020. Raymond Nat Turner, The Town Crier. All Rights Reserved.       

BAR’s poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner is an accomplished performing artist. You can find much more of his work at http://upsurgejazz.com .

COMMENTS?

Please join the conversation on Black Agenda Report's Facebook page at http://facebook.com/blackagendareport

Or, you can comment by emailing us at comments@blackagendareport.com

poetry

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


Related Stories

Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
Army of Artists (For My Friend Horace Silver)
17 December 2025
Harmony of a hug,Rhythm of a rose,Melody in the mirror
Editors, The Black Agenda Review
POEM: Poem for Walter Rodney, Edward Kamau Brathwaite, 1981  
11 June 2025
“any where or world where there is love there is the sky and its blue free
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
A few lines for the Poet Ojenke...
21 May 2025
RIP: Rise In Poetics to Ra
Editors, The Black Agenda Review
POEM: Reflections after the June 12th March of Disarmament, Sonia Sanchez, 1982
18 December 2024
“I have come to you tonite not just for the stoppage
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
Love My Black Job
11 September 2024
Love my Black Job— Black Student Union Job! Hired at L.A. City College As “The Peoples Poet!”
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
MrJoeSam’s Text Messages
12 June 2024
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR’s poet-in-residence, pays homage to San Francisco’s shipyard artist JoeSam who died peacefully on June 1, 2024, surroun
Editors, The Black Agenda Review
POEM: Enemy of the Sun, Samih al-Qasim, 1970
29 May 2024
Read against the terrible incineration of Rafah today, this poem of resistance and refusal, by Pa
Raymond Nat Turner
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
Dis-honest Broker
01 May 2024
"Dis-honest Broker" is the latest from BAR's Poet-in-Residence, recently performed at UpSurge!
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
Raymond Nat Turner at the UpSurge Jazz Celebration
03 April 2024
 
Image of Refaat Alareer sitting in a crowd of graduates
Editors, The Black Agenda Review
POEM: If I Must Die, Refaat Alareer, 2023
13 December 2023
Palestinian poet Refaat Alareer, a martyr of zionist state genocidal violence, has left us with a tale of resistance and hope.

More Stories


  • BAR Book Forum: André Brock Jr.’s “Distributed Blackness”
    André Brock Jr.
    BAR Book Forum: André Brock Jr.’s “Distributed Blackness”
    15 Jul 2021
    The online aggregation and coherence of Blackness online, absent Black bodies, is what inspired the author’s book.
  • BAR Book Forum: Kyla Schuller’s Book, “The Biopolitics of Feeling”
    Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
    BAR Book Forum: Kyla Schuller’s Book, “The Biopolitics of Feeling”
    15 Jul 2021
    The very physical category of femaleness was articulated by feminists and non-feminists alike as the sole property of whiteness in the 19th century,
  • Blackness and the Bomb
    Erica X Eisen
    Blackness and the Bomb
    15 Jul 2021
    Seventy years after the civil preparedness film Duck and Cover, it is long past time to reckon with the way white supremacy shaped U.S.
  • How History Textbooks Reflect America’s Refusal to Reckon with Slavery
    Cynthia Greenlee
    How History Textbooks Reflect America’s Refusal to Reckon with Slavery
    15 Jul 2021
    Textbooks are a battleground in which the humanity and status of black Americans are contested
  • How Amazon Exploited a Weakened America
    Sarah Leonard
    How Amazon Exploited a Weakened America
    15 Jul 2021
    Amazon will not stop squeezing every drop from workers until those workers have more power.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us