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

Oh, what a night…
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
21 Dec 2016
🖨️ Print Article

by BAR poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner

Our poet shares a scene from a late nite NYC subway ride home from this years' holiday party of the National Writers Union.

Oh, what a night…

by BAR poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner

“Oh, what a night…”

Red letters emblazoning big white cake

“Workers of the WORD, Unite!”

150 small, cloth flags hanging

from the ceiling, above our food,

Representing places, spaces

Working-class brothers and sisters gather

Breaking bread, sipping wine, gulping water…

Making memories, visualizing peace—better lives—

Not children’s, grandchildren’s broken, bloody bodies…

“Oh, what a night…”

Our NWU holiday party

Wild women of the WORD—

Friendships of fifty years

Talking “class struggle”, “socialism”

A woman, UAW leader, pops in

Announcing victory:

Research and Teaching Assistants

Won unionization at Columbia!

“Oh, what a night…”

Six bottles of sparking cider lighter,

On the A Train, heading

Home to Harlem in a hurry

Brothers behind me loud talkin’—

Not dissin’ or arguing—more like preachin’

To the choir

Brother One’s shouting ‘bout Cuba’s

schools and literacy compared to here.

Brother Two’s chimin’ in ‘bout the Bay of Pigs,

Allen Dulles, killing of Kennedy— just before

Brother Three jumps to billionaire appointees

Only in New York!

“Oh, what a night…”

Never mind three delays

between 34th and 125th

Couldn’t take it any longer—

Got up, got some of that WORD:

“Is this ‘The Friendship Train’

Listen to us—woop-woop—…doin’ our thing?

Y’all scaring me and folks up front with

that revolutionary foolishness!”

Smiling eyes, belly laugh betrayed me—but

Crescendo “Oooh!” response to my call:

“Hell, folks been asleep 8 years!”

Plus, pregnant pause, birthed this poem

Granting you permission to: pimp-slap, kick

fear-mongers to the curb; they squander

Seeds of struggle, rays of resistance… Listen to

Lil’ David’s lesson: Goliath’s gotta bring ass to kick ass…

Poet’s Note:

NWU is National Writers Union

UAW is United Auto Workers

Raymond Nat Turner © 2016 All Rights Reserved

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


More Stories


  •  Duboisian Scholar to Address BAR Gathering on “Building a Black Left”
    Black Agenda Radio with Nellie Bailey and Glen Ford
    Duboisian Scholar to Address BAR Gathering on “Building a Black Left”
    21 Oct 2019
    “Decades ago, much of the Black Left “turned its back on Black working people in the interest of aligning with the liberal establishment that controls the Democratic Party,” said Dr An
  • Haiti and the Convenience of Imperial Amnesia
    Jemima Pierre
    Haiti and the Convenience of Imperial Amnesia
    16 Oct 2019
    The ongoing protests in Haiti are ultimately directed against the “Core Group” – US imperialism and its junior partners, who have teamed up to gang-bang the wounded and bleeding Black republic.
  • Black Activists Targeted -- by FBI and Killers Unknown: Glen Ford on the Real News
    The Real News Network
    Black Activists Targeted -- by FBI and Killers Unknown: Glen Ford on the Real News
    16 Oct 2019
    TRNN correspondent Jacqueline Luqman and Black Agenda Report executive editor Glen Ford discuss the murders of Botham Jean and Joshua Brown in Dallas, Texas, the deaths of Black activists in F
  • Freedom Rider: Trump, Obama and Syria
    Margaret Kimberley , BAR editor and senior columnist
    Freedom Rider: Trump, Obama and Syria
    16 Oct 2019
    Whether by mistake or design, Donald Trump is presiding over the – agonizing slow – demise of Barack Obama’s illegal and immoral scheme to overthrow the government of Syria using jihadist terror ar
  • Syria: Exposing Western Radical Collaboration with Imperialism
    Ajamu Baraka , BAR editor and columnist
    Syria: Exposing Western Radical Collaboration with Imperialism
    16 Oct 2019
    “Western radicals must take a consistent anti-imperialist position despite the internal contradictions or problems that existwithin a state in the Global South.”
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us