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.
The Black Agenda Report team are deeply saddened to learn of the passing of Kevin Alexander Gray, who was a Black Agenda Report contributor, an author, and a longtime activist from South Carolina.
Netfa Freeman is an organizer with Pan African Community Action based in Washington DC, which is working on a campaign for community control over the police.
Frank Chapman is Executive Director of the National Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression. That organization led the fight for community control of the police, with the creation of the…
On March 8,1971 a brave group of people revealed the extent of FBI spying, harassment and even the killings of US citizens. More than 50 years later we would do well to remember the significance of…
Revisiting a 1974 editorial on Black women and the international struggle against patriarchy, racism, imperialism, and capitalism on International Women’s Day.
