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

Mengele Medicine… Free
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
12 Jul 2017

by BAR poet in residence Raynmond Nat Turner

This week our poet examines the links between the blankets settlers distributed among Native Americans and capitalism's reckless disregard of human, environmental and medica ethics.

Mengele Medicine… Free

by BAR poet in residence Raynmond Nat Turner

I.
My mom inspected
hell holes, City of
Angels,
ruled by devils.

Captured Angelinos
complained about
Not getting water.
Red punch, sí— water, no;
As the Founding Fathers,
The Framers—of warriors
and truth-tellers—intended…

Outside the city,
concertina wire veils
Loveless gray walls
keeping a grim gulag
out of sight, out of mind;
Concealing the work camp,
pharmaceutical
playground, infested
with sadistic torturers;
and Mengele medicine men
standing on skeletons—
suffering side-effects
of pulse-less persons,
$500.00 an hour lawyers.

Mengele medicine men,
practicing goober dust,
black cat dander, four-
leaf clover, rabbit’s foot,
aspirin for cancer quackery.
Experimenting with
effects of no water,
sugar water, fracked water,
black water, white bread
on diabetic shock subjects—
Side effects of remote-
controlled Death Panels,
posing as parole boards…

II.
Warriors, Freedom Fighters’
Sacrifices paved our way—
Heroic lamp-lighters
Long for light of day
And they gotta be Free, Free, Free
‘Cause they hold the Key, Key, Key

Resistance isn’t crime
When tellers of truth fight back
From cages of endless time
And peculiar tenure-track
And they gotta be Free, Free, Free
‘Cause they hold the Key, Key, Key

Torture arisoners, Prisoners of War…)

(1st stanza 1st time Rubato; Ballad feel;
1st stanza 2nd time to Groove)

Raymond Nat Turner © 2017 All Rights Reserved

BAR's Ppoet in residence, Raymond Nat Turner is an acclaimed poet and performance artist. We'll have to put up a booking page for him here soon. Meanwhile you can 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


  • COP26: Greenwashing and Plutocratic Misadventures
    ​​​​​​​ Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor and columnist
    COP26: Greenwashing and Plutocratic Misadventures
    17 Nov 2021
    For all the policy failures of COP26 it may actually be an inflection point in history -- a point where social and political conditions force a transformation of consciousness and politics that
  • Credit: AFP
    Jemima Pierre, BAR Editor and Columnist
    A Dirty Occupation: The UN’s Criminal Enterprise and Ecological Catastrophe in Haiti
    17 Nov 2021
    What are the environmental and ecological impacts of large-scale military occupations by the United Nations “peacekeeping” missions?
  • Editors, The Black Agenda Review
    EXCERPT: Genocide: The Social Lynching of Africans and their descendants in Brazil, Abdias do Nascimento
    17 Nov 2021
    The late Brazilian intellectual, artist, and activist Abdias do Nascimento argues that racial democracy is premised on an idea of racial mixing that not only valorizes whiteness, but is predica
  • BAR Book Forum: Camisha Russell’s “The Assisted Reproduction of Race”
    Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
    BAR Book Forum: Camisha Russell’s “The Assisted Reproduction of Race”
    17 Nov 2021
    In this series, we ask acclaimed authors to answer five questions about their book.
  • It is the liberal class which is determined to censor as much of public discourse as possible. They work with big technology social media companies to determine what will and will not be seen and heard in the media. In so doing they narrow the issues and positions which the public are able to consider for themselves.
    Danny Haiphong, BAR Contributing Editor
    Censorship is the Last Gasp of the Liberal Class
    17 Nov 2021
    It is the liberal class which is determined to censor as much of public discourse as possible.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us