by BAR Poet-in-Residence Raymond Nat Turner
When our giants go down, our spines must straighten up and create new beginnings.
Redouble our efforts…
(For Robert Knight, Chokwe, Amiri,
And others known and less known…)
by BAR Poet-in-Residence Raymond Nat Turner
When our Knights are captured
Or fall on battlefields, as they
Surely must, and we lose their
Brilliant lights and we are
Scrambling to pry pens,
Swords, spears, bread and
Roses from stainless steel
Grips of their icy hands—
Scrambling to hoist our
Fallen banners, temporarily
Mired in mud and blood,
Even higher, scrambling
To staunch rivulets of
Brine from our sweetly
Shattered hearts…
When our giants — in
All sizes — go down,
Our spines straighten
Honoring, immortalizing,
Their legends, burnished
Names, by divvying up
Cosmic, ancient, work
Creating them in the
Beginning…
Raymond Nat Turner © 2014 All Rights Reserved
Assata Shakur wrote the introduction and this poem for the 1990 book Hauling Up the Morning: writings & art by political prisoners and prisoners of war in the U.S.
Colombian Vice President Francia Márquez Mina is strengthening diplomatic relations with African countries and their connections with Colombia's African descended communities.
They called Assata Shakur a fugitive; we claim her as a compass. Her work and her words will continue to chart the path toward our liberation.
The empire has a new plan for Haiti, a return to military occupation dressed up as humanitarianism. Like past occupations, it will only increase the suffering of Haiti's people.
While Gaza burns, a collaborationist class is being handed the keys to a prison and calling it a state, all in service to western imperialism.
