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

MrJoeSam’s Text Messages
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
24 Jan 2024
🖨️ Print Article
JoeSam art
Courtesy JoeSam. and Museum of the African Diaspora, San Francisco Examiner

MrJoeSam’s Text Messages
“See with your ears,
and hear with your eyes …"

—Charlie Parker

I.

Happy hour colors are hummingbirds
hovering— Singing in 4 part harmony
At 3D jam sessions. His ebullient brushes are
Joysticks— conjuring Cool— after the Birth ...

Big! Bold! Proud! Loud! Resplendent rooster
Colors appear, reappear— disappear—
and allow us to be … Not shrink … fold …
Cowering in corners beneath       white hot gaze

Resplendent rooster colors call … Call us
Woke! Call us alert! Call us courageous! Spur
Improvisation— Make something from
Something else— disguised as ... Nothing ...

Dissonant colors imagine Monk’s “Bright Mississippi!”
Did I ever tell you MrJoeSam once lived high on Mississippi
Street smuggling medicine music onto canvases? Even Stevie
saw it …  stopped his driver and bought brushstrokes of love!

Did I ever tell you goog-ley eye implants appear, reappear, disappear,
Warning: Beware-beware-beware of eagle-eyed poles? Beware of
elephant-eared walls redacting 1st, 4th, 13th, 14th Amendments
for the 2nd Amendment and laws of war … on power to  The People?

Did I tell you goog-ley eye implants appear, reappear— disappear,
Warning: Beware-beware-beware of childlike belief in bipartisan
butchery? Death culture cruelty? … Orange buoy, saw blade, razor
wire welcomes in the Rio Grande?… Mass murder marathons in Gaza?

II.

I'm tryin, I’m Tranein … to make my pen mix and sing
Colors his brushes splash crimson awfulness on canvas with.
I'm tryin, I’m Tranein … to fling wildflowers from shoulders of the
Long and winding road to
My friend, mentor, big brother figure—Son of Harlem—
neither Super Storm Sandy, nor swollen Connecticut River
could wash away

I'm tryin, I’m Tranein … to fling wildflowers MrJoeSam might
catch. Maybe be pricked by their thorns? Maybe hear their colors
Pop Lady Day-like gardenia notes …
I'm tryin, I’m Tranein … to fling fresh wildflowers— to this
Already colorful, fully saturated, Son of Harlem— baaad as hell!\

© 2024. Raymond Nat Turner, The Town Crier. All Rights Reserved.

 

Raymond Nat Turner is a NYC poet; BAR's Poet-in-Residence; and founder/co-leader of the jazz-poetry ensemble UpSurge!NYC. You can Vote for his work at GoFundMe and PayPal.

Harlem
Art
Charlie Parker

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
SONNY
27 May 2026
Our wise Monk-guru, White winter mane and Douglass beard,Sonny's anOak tree growing outSugar Hill concrete—
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
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
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!
Lorraine Hansberry
Editors, The Black Agenda Review
SPEECH: A Challenge to Artists, Lorraine Hansberry, 1962
21 February 2024
At a rally against the House Un-American Activities Committee, insurgent playwright Lorrainne Hansberry called on artists to shake off the fear
For Larry Roland
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
For Larry Roland
08 March 2023
                                         
BAR Book Forum: Boukary Sawadogo’s Book, “Africans in Harlem”
Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
BAR Book Forum: Boukary Sawadogo’s Book, “Africans in Harlem”
24 August 2022
In this series, we ask acclaimed authors to answer five questions about their book.
A lil’ homegoing homage to Brother Donald…
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
A lil’ homegoing homage to Brother Donald…
27 April 2022
Donald Smith always performe
BAR Book Forum: Jennifer S. Ponce de León’s “Another Aesthetics Is Possible”
Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
BAR Book Forum: Jennifer S. Ponce de León’s “Another Aesthetics Is Possible”
07 December 2021
In this series, we ask acclaimed authors to answer five questions about their book.
Photo: Kevin W. Thorbourne
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
Bird, strings, Big Chief: 100: Harlem (For Charlie Parker/Donald Harrison/Harlem Symphony Orchestra)
08 September 2021
Bird, strings, Big Chief: 100: Harlem (For Charlie Parker/Donald Harrison/Harlem Symphony Orchestra)  

More Stories


  • Freedom Rider: Democrats’ Climate Change Lies
    Margaret Kimberley, BAR senior columnist
    Freedom Rider: Democrats’ Climate Change Lies
    16 Sep 2020
    The Republicans lie about the harm they do to the planet, and the Democrats lie and pretend they’re not doing the very same things.
  • Tribute to Kevin Zeese: Life and Loss in the Struggle for Liberation
    Danny Haiphong , BAR contributor
    Tribute to Kevin Zeese: Life and Loss in the Struggle for Liberation
    16 Sep 2020
    Zeese never wavered in his opposition to the corporate duopoly, white supremacy, and the forces of militarism.
  • Will a Biden Foreign Policy Make a Difference for the World?
    ​​​​​​​ Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor and columnist
    Will a Biden Foreign Policy Make a Difference for the World?
    16 Sep 2020
    For the people of the world the real fascism of anti-democratic, brutal regimes supported by the U.S., murderous sanctions, and right-wing coups will continue unabated. 
  • Fourteen Martyrs in the Struggle Against Racist Terror and Trumpism-Fascism
    Paul Street
    Fourteen Martyrs in the Struggle Against Racist Terror and Trumpism-Fascism
    16 Sep 2020
    Their names are not as familiar as George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, but these victims have paid the ultimate price, dying in the line of anti-racist and anti-fascist citizenship duty.
  • 1st 100 Days— Portland  
    Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
    1st 100 Days— Portland  
    16 Sep 2020
    I have a friend—some- time bandmate—Daily… Whining, wringing his hands. Distressed and depressed— anxious and agitated—he Knows nuclear war and Armageddon are on the
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us