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

Everything they touch turns to rubble
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
11 Mar 2026
🖨️ Print Article
Caracas, Venezuela after bombing
Smoke rises in Caracas, Venezuela on January 3, 2026 following a US bombing campaign. Photo via X

Saddest symphony on Earth. Trembling notes, harrowing screams, wails,
moans. Same timbre, same tones. Same saline Palestine tears as Sudan.
Same as Ukraine, Lebanon, Venezuela, Iran. Same 1% at war with
workers of the world — and Everything they touch turns to rubble

Tiny backpacks, bloody body parts litter pulverized apartment and charred-
car streets. Stolen lives litter flattened hospitals and schools. Litter crimson
coffee shop floors. Litter blackened fields of vaporized crops.
Everything they touch turns to rubble

They bomb, they strut. They prance and ‘dance,’ and bomb and bomb again.
Their lucrative explosions silence music of whining saws, pounding hammers 
raising roofs to house the unhoused. While abroad they shout, “stay sheltered!”
Everything they touch turns to rubble

High off homeland invasion hubris, hostile takeovers weeks before, they
dream of easy money. Quick work of a weekend war. But weekend morphs
into weeks. And weeks into months. And months into the longest leanest years.
Everything they touch turns to rubble

Pyrite wrecking balls revolving around orange planet, Pedophilia. ‘Round its Epstein
news cycles. ‘Round its smell of death, scent of sulphur, white phosphorus fragrance
anointing them. They send holy warriors to strike Saturdays, Sundays and holidays; and
Everything they touch turns to rubble

They strike when Essential Workers catch fleeting winks on speeding trains roaring
beneath snoring cities. When countrymen and women dreaming of better worlds are
not yet woke. Cruel Reich Cult strikes under cover of darkness over and over again
Everything they touch turns to rubble

Cruel Reich Cult strikes weekends when working ones double over panting,
catching blitzkrieg breaths. Or meditate, chant, or pray protecting their souls,
spirits and minds from repeated trauma of terrorist Psy-Ops on our damn dime.
Everything they touch turns to rubble

Body count from One Big Beautiful Bank Job. Wreckage, wake of DOGE:
Department Of Grifter Enrichment. Frozen, drowned, burned bodies pile up at
feet of foolish climate deniers; with roadkill credited to Mengele medicine men
Everything they touch turns to rubble

J6 white supremacists storming Capitalist Hill, ransacking offices, shitting in its halls —
ugly omen — foreshadowed shredded social safety net. Scuttled science and education.
War House-Offal Office grifted in gold. Kennedy Center shuttered; Bill Of Rights redacted.
Everything they touch turns to rubble


© 2026. 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.

MAGA
Donald Trump
Iran
Palestine
Venezuela
Sudan
imperialism
War
Corruption
Epstein Class

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


Related Stories

Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
Defending a Non-Existent International Law
30 September 2026
The Hague Group’s goal is to “. . .
Abel Prieto
Venezuela: It Is What You See
30 September 2026
A photograph of Delcy Rodríguez smiling with Donald Trump after the U.S.
Pambazuka News Editors
Türkiye, UAE, and the Imperialist Chain: African Ports and War
30 September 2026
Imperialist competition and wars that facilitate extractivism have long shaped the use of seaports for access to resources, markets, and devalu
Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
The U.S. Determination to Achieve Full Spectrum Dominance is Not In Decline
23 September 2026
The trope of the United States being in a state of decline is a common one, but it should not be accepted without scrutiny. The U.S.
Jacqueline Luqman
The Perfect Victim Narrative Applied To Foreign Policy Only Keeps U.S. Imperialism Alive
23 September 2026
The demand to call out alleged crimes in Iran or Cuba while those countries face annihilation from the U.S.
Roberta Rivolta
Western Activism and the Axis of Resistance
23 September 2026
Western pro-Palestinian activism isolates Palestine from its regional allies, depoliticizing its struggle and reinforcing colonial
Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
The Ultimate Betrayal of Alex Saab and the Fate of Nicolás Maduro and the Venezuelan People
16 September 2026
The United States got its hands on Alex Saab a second time in order to use him in its case against Nicolás Maduro. The U.S.
Editors, The Black Agenda Review
COMMENTARY: The Shrinking American Empire, Glen Ford, 2009
16 September 2026
“The Iraq invasion greatly accelerated the process of U.S. imperialism’s decline.” 
Gary Wilson
Germany’s war drive feeds the far right in Saxony-Anhalt
16 September 2026
The AfD's landslide in Saxony-Anhalt reflects real working-class anger at the war and the arms buildup, but the party redirects that anger towa
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
In the same boat?
09 September 2026
BOOM goes tuna and swordfish stuffed brown burlap bags aboardboats blown to smithereens. Presto! Fishing is now narco-trafficking.

More Stories


  • Black Alliance for Peace Haiti/Americas Team
    MOLEGHAF: Update on Armed Attacks in Port-au-Prince
    23 Oct 2024
    Western imperialist-backed paramilitary violence in Port-au-Prince, Haiti has escalated in the last year. As the conditions on the ground worsen, MOLEGHAF puts out this call to allies around the…
  • Jonathan Cook
    The West's Support for Israel's Genocide is Destroying the World as we Know it
    23 Oct 2024
    The old world is dying once again, but the US-Israel axis is wrong to suggest it is slaying monsters. It is the monster.
  • Lylla Younes
    Black Residents in Cancer Alley Try What May be a Last Legal Defense to Curb Toxic Pollution
    23 Oct 2024
    In St. James Parish, a zoning ordinance divides industrial development along racial lines.
  • Justin Podur
    Yahya Sinwar Wrote His Own Story
    23 Oct 2024
    Yahya Sinwar was a man who became a larger-than-life symbol of Palestinian resistance and struggle. Myths and rumors surrounded him in life and now in death but he did not need anyone, friend or foe…
  • Austin Cole
    Municipalism, Economic Development, and People Power for Participatory Democracy – A Conversation with Nicholas Richard-Thompson, Part I
    23 Oct 2024
    As part of this research on grassroots economic projects toward Black Liberation, Austin Cole spoke with Nicholas Richard-Thompson about his community organizing, expanding definitions of…
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us