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

Embassy crawlers, kidnappers, Butchers and Boss Tweet…
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
15 May 2019
🖨️ Print Article
standoff at the Venezuelan embassy
Standoff at the Venezuelan embassy

“The receiving State is under a special duty to take all appropriate steps to protect the premises of the mission against any intrusion or damage and to prevent any disturbance of the peace of the mission or impairment of its dignity.”
— Article 22 Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, 1961.

Whistles blowing, sirens blaring through bullhorns,
strobe lights flashing to pounding, banging rhythms
It must be the embassy medieval thugs mistook
for a butcher shop—or the one thugs entered to
kidnap towering truth-teller?

Instead, evening’s infested with
pot and pan-banging blue arm bands, Assault-Right
hipsters with Hitler haircuts; choreographed from
The War House and Capitalist Hill.

Ordinarily, big banner headlines splash
Post, Times, Wall Street Journal:
Americans Holed up in Foreign Embassy
surrounded by secret police blocking food,
medicine, supplies; shutting off electricity,
assaulting, arresting peaceful protestors:
Replacing rule of law with Law of Jungle;
Violating Vienna Convention, abdicating
responsibility
to
protect…

Ordinarily, Fox-box foot-soldiers/State Department
stenographers are on the ground grindin’— 24/7
with talking heads hopping mad—shit-fit, send-
in-the Marines-mad—for Boeing’s war of the week
versus strongman who became the wrong man!
Rogue state with redacted 1st and 4th amendments,
we wait for wet, cold, Wikileak words: “Live from New
York, it’s Saturday…”

© 2019. Raymond Nat Turner, The Town Crier. All Rights Reserved.
Our poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner is an acclaimed performning artist, educator and an oficial of the National Writers Union.
Find much more of his work at http://upsurgejazz.com.

Venezuela

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


More Stories


  • Struggle La Lucha
    ICE Raids Escalate in LA As Community Fights Back
    11 Jun 2025
    While ICE and law enforcement unleash raids across LA, protesters stand firm, exposing the brutal machinery of deportation and the state’s violent response to dissent and resistance.
  • Jonathan Forney
    7 Supreme Court Cases That Black Americans Should Track This Summer
    11 Jun 2025
    Issues before the high court range from health care access and citizenship to workplace discrimination and redistricting.
  • Nora Barrows-Friedman
    US and Israel Turn “Aid” Centers Into Slaughter Zones
    11 Jun 2025
    Nowhere is safe in Gaza. US-backed Israeli forces are turning aid centers into slaughter zones, targeting starving civilians as they desperately search for food and medicine.
  • Mnar Adley
    “So They’ll Never Have Children”: American Nurse Says Israeli Soldiers Deliberately Shot Boys in the Penis
    11 Jun 2025
    Gaza’s hospitals have become killing fields, and medical workers witness Israeli forces executing unarmed civilians, including children.
  • Roger D. Harris
    Ballots and Bias: How the Press Framed Venezuela’s Regional and Legislative Elections
    11 Jun 2025
    Roger D. Harris analyzes Western media's biased and dishonest coverage of Venezuela's May 25 election and the sweeping Chavismo victory.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us