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
  • omnibus

The acrobats are back…(gimme a bleepin’ break!)
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
12 May 2021
🖨️ Print Article
The acrobats are back…(gimme a bleepin’ break!)
The acrobats are back…(gimme a bleepin’ break!)

The acrobats are back—riding bareback and backwards on
Donkeys! They’re back juggling hocus-pocus focus groups;
Back, spinning Wall Street straw into fools’ gold for the war-
mongering mouth of a punch drunk politician. Back hallucinating
on FDR Fairytales. Back somersaulting over scarlet streets, strikes and 
factory seizures; back vaulting over violence/militant eviction resistance

The acrobats are back—Lilliputian left-Munchkin Marxists—juggling 
Classless analysis; doing back-flips erasing millions; Tumbling above
herds of handcuffed communists, socialists, anarchists, trade unionists 
who waged pitched battles with Pinkerton-police-national guard-gun thugs.
The acrobats are back turning cartwheels; Flipping history on its head—
Landing squarely in the laps of generals and statesmen…

The acrobats are back—flipping LBJ minus 34 dead and smoke-filled skies 
over Watts/43 dead in Detroit/27 dead, 1400 arrests in Newark; LBJ minus millions 
marching NO to Jim Crow, war/women’s oppression; Minus martyrs—whose M’s 
include Mickey, Medgar, Malcolm, Martin… The acrobats are back,
dancing in donkey dung down the Yellow Brick Road for the Emerald City
Intersectional Empire—strangely resembling the Pentagon…

The acrobats are back—daredevils who dangled dangerously for 8 yrs. from 
the Drone Ranger’s dick. They’re back—Capitalist Hill cartwheels and flips—sticking 
stealth socialist landings as Comrade Schmo plays them like The 
Great Oz—ominously warning: “Pay no attention to Wall Street-War-Profiteer-
Big Pharma/Fossil Fuel-Credit Card Companies behind my thin blue curtain of 
Promises!” Then he quietly pulls his pistol and mumbles,”What’s in your wallet?”

© 2021. 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 https://www.youtube.com/user/zigilow

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

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!”
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
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.
Protest for Palestine at the White House
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
Trigger Warning
22 November 2023
Trigger Warning Palestine’s the Answer— What was the Question?
Another June 1
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
Another June 1
07 June 2023
                                       
BAR Book Forum: Jon Jon Moore’s “The Calling: Poems”
Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
BAR Book Forum: Jon Jon Moore’s “The Calling: Poems”
16 February 2022
In this series, we ask acclaimed authors to answer five questions about their book.
Our ‘democracy’
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
Our ‘democracy’
23 July 2021
Shangri-La—untaxed, socially-distanced champagne- caviar, Cayman Island, yacht crowds who

More Stories


  • Jon Jeter
    How Charlie Kirk’s Murder Exposes Free Speech as a Tool for American Exceptionalism
    17 Sep 2025
    The assassination of a far-right demagogue raises the question: when does 'free speech' become a tool for inciting violence? Nations like South Africa and Brazil have decided that some speech is not…
  • Africa Climate Summit
    Anthony Karefa Rogers-Wright
    Africa Climate Summit Reflections Part 2: The Youth Are Getting Restless…and That’s a Good Thing
    17 Sep 2025
    “The youth are getting restless. I can't hear you, Let them hear you all the way to Washington, The youth are getting restless, Own creation, The Youth are Getting Restless, And once again a nation,…
  • Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
    School Shooting Du Jour. War Of The Week
    17 Sep 2025
    "School Shooting Du Jour. War Of The Week" is the latest from BAR's Poet-in-Residence.
  • R.E. Wilson
    Bolsonaro and Brazil at the Edge
    17 Sep 2025
    Bolsonaro’s conviction is not a victory for democracy but a revelation of its fragility. It exposes a military that remains the armed wing of the ruling class and a fascist project dedicated to…
  • Francis Phillip
    The Imperial Contradiction Behind the 2023 Fuel Subsidy Removal in Nigeria
    17 Sep 2025
    Nigeria’s inability to refine its own oil is a legacy of British and US imperialism designed to maintain dependence. President Tinubu’s removal of the fuel subsidy was not an economic reform but an…
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us