Black lives matter…(Too much to pimp on the Trail of Tricks)
by BAR poet-in-residence Raymond Nat Turner
“I am convinced socialism is the only answer and I urge all comrades to take this struggle to victorious conclusion. Only this will free us from the chains of bigotry and exploitation…” – Malala Yousafzai, 17 year-old Nobel Peace Prize Winner
I.
The Chinese used to
Have a saying about
Pyrrhic victories:
Reactionaries
Lifting rocks only
To drop them on their own feet—
A killer cop walks
In one city, the
People march in 170…
Lifting hot buttered
Boulders, working hard
Deploying sheep-dipped
Snitches, crooked as
Dogs’ hind legs, half-
A-muthafucka
Talking heads, handlers,
Slick lawyers wearing
Mule shit aftershave—
Operatives and assets—
Do they ever learn?
Not even part of
Much less heading the
Fresh, young, unsullied
Resistance, magma
Rising from cracks in
Concrete, flowing through
Streets flaming like a
“Night in Tunisia—”
Operatives, assets—
March to mislead, march
To misdirect, march
To disrupt, march to
Otherwise neutralize
Extinguish flaming
Magma bubbling below
Cool Messiahs metastasizing in millions…
Working overtime—
Operatives and
Assets—eunuch sorcerers,
Sordid 1%
Black magic men, march
To suck fire and air
From our Black, Brown, Tan
Babies’ bodies, march
To crease faces, crush steel
Drain spirit, hope and
Revolutionary sparkle from their eyes…
Working overtime—
Operatives and
Assets—fake drum majors
Charade and parade
Strut, prance, buck dance
Down Co-opt Cul-de-sac SW
Dark, steep, twisting mule
Dung slippery Trail of Tricks
Off Resistance Road NE, and
Back under tanned spell
Of their glib Warlock
Working overtime—
Operatives and
Assets—black capitalist
Hustlers/herders trussing
Up young ones to the
Mule and cackling Wicked
Witch of the West,
Waiting in the wings,
Working on her war
Cry and bloody crystal ball
As sand slowly slips
Through her hourglass, and
Revolutionaries
Of the Civil Rights
And COINTELPRO
Era time out in dungeons…
II.
Yes, Revolutionaries
Of the Civil Rights
And COINTELPRO
Era, Afros, handshakes, spirit fire, theory,
Slogans and solidarity with Vietnamese,
South Africans, Palestinians, and others
Beautiful like you, time out in dungeons…
So, why’s the War House
Hosting you, our brilliant Black,
Brown, Tan babies?
Why’s the War House serenading
You with cognitive dissonant
Doo-Wop ‘Mistrust,’ like
A torch song of unrequited love?
Why’s the War House crooning
The shop worn song ‘Hearings,’
To hear what you’ve heard since you toddled?
By the time we get to ‘Phoenix,’
‘Gladio,’ ‘Paperclip,’ ‘Mongoose,’ JFK
MLK, RFK, Malcolm, Bunchy/John,
We’ll all sing like Snowden, Manning
Or, at least Jim and/ or Gary Webb!
So, why’s the War House
Hosting you, whose die-ins,
Flash-mobs, marches, are
Shutting malls, opening
Minds, undercutting
Consumerism—
Upsetting business as usual?
Why’s the War House
Hosting you, who with
Your feet, declare war
On acute care capitalism,
Its state, fading dollar,
Scorned by BRICS, hurt by
Boomeranging Asia ‘Pivot’?
Sammy Cahn speaks well—
“He knows all the lines and
He knows how to lie…”
Carl Braden told me,
“They buy some, fool some,
Jail some, shoot some…”
III.
The grass is greener
At the foot of lower
Manhattan, pregnant
With four huge mounds, mass
Graves where our African
Ancestors rest; men, women,
Children, vertebrae compressed like
Accordions from carrying heavy loads,
Muscles, ligaments, tendons torn from
Bone, every day ‘Black Friday’—
For exploiters of African labor—
Black lives matter, Black lives matter…
Under Socialism, under communism…
Raymond Nat Turner can be contacted at Raymond (at) upsurgejazz.com
Raymond Nat Turner © 2014 All Rights Reserved
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To dismiss revolutionary theory is to choose permanent defeat, reducing the movement to a hamster wheel of reaction and co-opted rage.
Preserving the Black Radical Tradition demands struggle not only against white supremacists, but also against the co-opted Black political class who actively support the very evils Dr. King named.
Africans in the U.S. must weaponize their position and sabotage imperial projects from the inside. Black revolutionaries must modify traditional strategy.
