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

Reclaiming Our Time for the Planet
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
03 Nov 2021
🖨️ Print Article
Reclaiming Our Time for the Planet

                                                                    Reclaiming our time

                                                                       for the Planet…

 

Grand Canyon bathtub rings telling

us the Colorado River’s dropped over

150 feet. Twenty years of drought—And

A wildfire a week; A nor’easter; superstorm;

hurricane; tornado; typhoon; And

tsunami over blackened birds, slimy, gooey,

tar balled waters—obligatory oil spills over

Corporate propaganda cycles—A delicious

recipe for disaster…

Whisker-sized particulate matter’s winning

Air superiority in pumpkin skies. Skies

Bees buzzed decks from; Skies hummingbirds

and butterflies hung out in.

Skies crows dropped from, jamming with

pigeons and spying on stashing/noshing

squirrels. A place you could get a gallon of

unleaded water that smelled drinkable…

This was before Roundup Ready corporate

propaganda cycles ejaculating Satan’s sperm

into our aquifers. Before prioritizing our

Friends by stages/types of cancer they suffer…

No need for nuance here—let’s say it simply—

say it plainly:

the kettle’s been on the back burner whistling

Frantically for decades—Warning of capitalist

immolation…And the world can’t wait…

The world can’t wait…Bassackwards…

for 21st century technology to catch

up with 17th century ideology—can’t

wait in perpetuity on old

mush-mouthed men’s mumblings on markets—

Seventeenth century

catechisms covering 21st century climate crimes…

The world can’t wait…

for more inflated claptrap; more cleverly crafted

lies—more methane promises huffed and puffed—

Killing us softly with their carbon…

 

© 2021. Raymond Nat Turner, The Town Crier. All Rights Reserved.

Former forklift driver/warehouse worker/janitor, 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: https://www.gofundme.com/f/the-town-criers-big-tooth-fund

PayPal: paypal.me/towncrierRNT

 

Climate Change

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


Related Stories

Anthony Karefa Rogers-Wright
Documents of Disaster and Conferences of Calamity: Rhetorical Questions, Questions of Rhetoric and the Transition  from Fossil Fuels
29 April 2026
The First Conference on Transitioning Away from Fossil Fuels produced a People's Declaration.
Anthony Karefa Rogers-Wright
The EPA’s Zero Sum Game Surfaces a Dialectical Paradox That Should Be Celebrated, Not Decried
04 February 2026
The debate over the EPA's new math misses the point.
Abayomi Azikiwe, Black Agenda Report Contributor
COP29 Summit Marked by Acrimonious Debate Over Emissions and Finance
27 November 2024
Annual climate gathering reflects divisions between the industrialized states and the Global South.
Anthony Karefa Rogers-Wright
If You Want to See White “Supremacy” at Work, Don’t go to a Trump Rally, Observe the Democrats’ Approach to Climate Change
29 May 2024
Despite the undeserved loyalty of Black people to the Democratic Party, lawmakers continue to push policy that ignores concerns about
Children near destroyed solar panels in Gaza
Melissa Garriga
Don’t Let Warmongers Greenwash their Ecocide this Earth Day
24 April 2024
The destruction of the environment and acceleration of the climate crisis happen silently under the veil of “national security,” despite t
Shasta people
Zach Frye
No Green For Go: How Settler-Colonialism Kills More Than Just People
27 March 2024
Settler colonialism has caused the destruction of indigenous lands around the world and, as a result, the environment in which we all live.
Flooding in Somalia
Ann Garrison, BAR Contributing Editor
Climate Profiteers Exploit Somali Suffering
20 December 2023
NGOs and other climate profiteers treat Somalia as a poster child for global warming.
COP 28 Logo
Abayomi Azikiwe
COP28 Summit Concludes with Contradictory Agreement
20 December 2023
Originally published in
Money for Weapons as the World Burns
Vijay Prashad
Money for Weapons as the World Burns
11 May 2022
$100 billion was pledged to assist the Global South amidst the climate change crisis but world wide defense spending now exceeds $2 trilli
Don't Look Up Reflects the Cynicism of Capitalist Decay, for Better and for Worse
Danny Haiphong, BAR Contributing Editor
Don't Look Up Reflects the Cynicism of Capitalist Decay, for Better and for Worse
05 January 2022
The controversial film offers insight into the crisis of the system but misses the mark in key areas.

More Stories


  • Mark P. Fancher
    If You are Born in this Country with Black skin, You are Already in Jail
    24 Jun 2026
    Malcolm X explained it well. Every Black person in this country is a prisoner, sometimes literally behind bars, and sometimes on the outside of jail, but a prisoner, nonetheless.
  • Beverley Waithaka
    Kenya Is Not America's Quarantine Zone
    24 Jun 2026
    The United States announced that Kenya, with the permission of a comprador government, would serve as an Ebola quarantine hub for Americans, ignoring the will of the Kenyan people and treating the…
  • North-South Project for People(s)-Centered Human Rights
    Resisting U.S. Human Rights Barbarism: The Arrest of Alyssa Philip In Trinidad and Tobago
    24 Jun 2026
    A protest leader in Trinidad was arrested during Labour Day celebrations for the crime of demanding justice for a paralyzed shooting victim. The government's willingness to silence dissent at home…
  • Isaac Saney
    Walking the Tight-Rope and Threading the Needle: Strategic Adaptation Under Siege: Cuba's Economic Reforms and the Defence of Socialist Sovereignty
    24 Jun 2026
    Washington's economic war has left Cuba with few good options. The recently announced reforms require a very thorough analysis.
  • Janine Jackson 
    How Many Ways Can You Avoid Reporting That Cops Killed a Baby?
    24 Jun 2026
    A one-year-old baby was shot dead by police, but corporate media shield the police and their barbaric actions with a passive voice.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us