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
  • omnibus

Blitzkrieg
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
08 Mar 2017
🖨️ Print Article

by BAR poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner

Blows and kicks are raining thick and fast, though many miss their mark their mark. But the intention of the 45th president is plainly to take us somewhere we really don't want to go, in a hurry or at all. Are we prepared to resist?

Boss Tweet’s Blitzkrieg

by BAR poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner

I wake up in a cold sweat

Scrambling for the internet—

What damage has daily doses of Shock and awe—blitzkrieg—done?

What salvoes were let loose

while we slept?

How badly

Bombed is the social safety net?

What rights are left?

Is blitzkrieg a 140 character shtik—

Boss Tweet’s clever crafting; swift installation of Fascist framework, the Cheeto Bandito's handiwork?

Or, are unnamed players pullers of strings;

ALEC architects of orders and edicts—pens

Included—narcissist’s signature required?




Bless the left, left behind holding their noses…

Debating a Devil’s disciple, apprentice Führer

And lil’ fella, funny mustache, jackboots, stiff

Salutes; versus Brooks Bros. suits…

(They dig definitions:

“Overt terroristic dictatorship

most reactionary,

most chauvinistic

most imperialist elements

of finance capital…

establishment of

Fascism reflects inability

of the ruling capitalist class

to maintain power by

Usual ‘democratic’ methods”)

Are we there?

Or should we, unsuspecting

Frogs, wait in the water, in the pot on the

stove, while you ‘unpack’, nuance, contextualize

Complexities of class war waged by the 1%?

Are we there?

Or should we spend 2-4 yrs blood and

Treasure chasing corporate slogans

and longing for seats at the table—

When we’re on the menu?

Are we there?

Or is it only the offal office oozing orange pus—

Or the whole bloody, rotten, yellow-taped, white supreme court, capitalist hill crime scene—

Where thugs make the law as they break the law?

Are we there?

Or is there a method to Michigan’s madness:

Flint’s poisoned water/overthrown elected government;

Whirlpool’s cesspool—golf course coup in Benton Harbor;

Detroit under anti-democratic, corporate control?

Are we there?

Or should we continue passionate pleas to

Sociopaths—moral messages to cold-blooded

Killers; treatises, eloquent arguments to

Madmen and women water-boarding, bombing the world?

Are we there?

Or is it some new ‘Alt/post’ patriarchy—

From founding fathers, framers, doubling as

Murderers, torturers, land and wage thieves—

pussy grabbers of grandmothers, granddaughters?

Are we there?

Are we ready to have a conversation on Race?

Race to Resist and rid ourselves of corporate

Killers poisoning the planet’s water, air, food—

Torching Mother Earth—

Race to Unite in workplaces, schools, churches…

Training and organizing ourselves ASAP to

STOP

These mutha-fukkkas; or, perish as fools:

If this Race doesn’t quicken the pulse—

Check your embalming fluid…

Raymond Nat Turner Š 2017 All Rights Reserved

Raymond Nat Turner is an acclaimed poet and performing artist.

Find much more of his work at Http://upsurgejazz.com

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


More Stories


  • Jon Jeter
    Making a Mountain out of a Mole Hill, Trump Sends Troops to Los Angeles, Hoping to Energize His MAGA Base
    11 Jun 2025
    Trump deploys Marines against LA protesters, echoing Nixon’s Kent State crackdown. But this time, he faces a broader, greatly disaffected opposition ready to fight back.
  • Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
    BAR Book Forum: Edna Bonhomme’s Book, “A History of the World in Six Plagues”
    11 Jun 2025
    This week’s featured author is Edna Bonhomme. Bonhomme is a historian of science, culture writer, and journalist based in Berlin, Germany. Her book is A History of the World in Six Plagues: How…
  • Jill Clark-Gollub
    Daniel Ortega is No Bukele
    11 Jun 2025
    Ortega and Bukele are polar opposites: one invests in dignity and democracy, the other in mass incarceration and imperial alliances.
  • Aiyana Porter-Cash
    False Promises of Protection Embedded in U.S. Militarism and Carcerality
    11 Jun 2025
    "Protection" is a lie—a pretext for state violence, militarism, and control, targeting the marginalized while masking harm as care. True safety comes not from oppressive systems, but from resistance…
  • Black Alliance For Peace
    Oppression Breeds Resistance, Organization Sustains It
    11 Jun 2025
    Defeating the war on Black/African people requires solidarity with all who are oppressed and resistance against our common enemy.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us