What makes you hopeful?
(For Kris and KT)
”…I hope someday you’ll join us.
And the world will live as one.”
—John Lennon
There are times she asks me, “What gives you hope?”
I say, “Ain’t The Audacity of Dope—“
Ol’ Schmo, Slick Willy or The Drone Ranger
It’s random acts of kindness from a stranger
It’s Farmers Markets, Co-Ops and mutual aid
It’s those first crayon drawings my children made!
It’s couples taking care of each other
It’s a professor teaching his grandmother
It’s the bad saxophonist who can sing—
It’s the hot Jazz group that can playground swing
It’s a young drummer who’s living his dream…
It’s John Coltrane blowing A Love Supreme!
It’s the cozy, sable, zippered sweater
It’s brilliant teachers making me better
It’s red flags flying from a church steeple—
It’s gangstas woke—now serving the people!
It’s school children walking out in protest
It’s freedom fighters who risk arrest…
It’s an addict living clean and sober
It’s Ferguson’s thru-line to Strike-tober
It’s speeches of Malcolm and Dr. King
It’s George Floyd Summer thawing Arab Spring…
It’s my ‘rabbi’ dying—then coming back
It’s waking up this morning—proud and Black
It’s fifteen minutes of flame once a week—
It’s Tryin’/Tranein’ for my Wikileak!
© 2022. Raymond Nat Turner, The Town Crier. All Rights Reserved.
Former forklift driver/warehouse worker/janitor, Raymond Nat Turner is a NYC poet; BAR's Poet-in-Residence; and founder/co-leader of the jazz-poetry ensemble UpSurge!NYC. You can Vote for his work at:
GoFundMe: https://www.gofundme.com/f/the-town-criers-big-tooth-fund
PayPal: paypal.me/towncrierRNT
Brazil's incumbent president Lula da Silva finished second behind Flavio Bolsonaro in the first round of the presidential election. Because neither man received at least 51% of the vote, a run-off…
Students in France are engaging in mass protests. Hundreds of them have been arrested and injured by police, and many schools are closed. Annick Metefia joins us from Paris. She is a member of the…
Ajamu Baraka of the Black Alliance for Peace joins Dimitri Lascaris on BettBeat Media for a conversation about something Western publics have not yet come to terms with — the fact that resistance to…
Progressive candidates rarely remain so after winning public office. Zohran Mamdani is no exception, but his capitulation to New York zionists angered his supporters, and the people he hoped to…
“Between October 2 and October 8, 1937, between 15,000 and 40,000 Haitians and Black Dominicans were slaughtered by Dominican troops…”
