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

Poor Peoples’ March
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
22 Jun 2022
🖨️ Print Article
Poor Peoples’ March
Rev. Ralph Abernathy leads the Poor People's March from Resurrection City to the grounds of the U.S. Capitol building in Washington, June 24, 1968.

                                                                                                                   Poor Peoples’ March

                                                                                                “Poverty is the parent of revolution and crime.”  

                                                                                                                            —Aristotle

Rainbow drum majors

arrived down from broken

hearted Buffalo—up from

Uvalde—Down south; Out

south; Up south. Trekkers,

drivers, flyers, bus riders arrived.

Essential Workers—a few months

ago; for a minute—arrived from their

robotic jobs…Over-worked/underpaid.

Children from COVID-canceled families

Arrived. Food workers on blistered, swollen

feet and un-operated on knees arrived.

Toilers under poverty’s knee and low-wealth’s

swastika-tatted arm arrived.

Grassroots, salt of the earth, everyday people

arrived.

Hurt first/hurt worst Black, Brown, Indigenous

impacted people arrived.

Inflation-riddled poverty scholars from food

apartheid bantustans arrived.

Labor’s soldiers, siloed sea to shiny sea, arrived.

Standing shoulder to shoulder Juneteenth

on un-ceded Anacostan Ancestral land, galvanizing,

mobilizing—flashing glimpses of 30s/60s greatness

from Arab Spring, Occupy, George Floyd Summer,

Strike-tober reflections…

Carving cursive initials in granite of a 100 year-old

Healthcare for ALL fight…

© 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 and PayPal.

 

Poor People's Campaign
Poor People's March

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


Related Stories

Editors, The Black Agenda Review
ESSAY: Resurrection City: The Dream…The Accomplishments, Jesse Jackson, 1968
18 February 2026
“The Poor People’s Campaign is the greatest single challenge ever unleashed upon our colonial system.”
The Poor People's Campaign and the Moral Dilemma of Liberalism
​​​​​​​ Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor and columnist
The Poor People's Campaign and the Moral Dilemma of Liberalism
04 May 2022
The demands for justice at home and abroad must not be sacrificed on the altar of what is called pragmatism.

More Stories


  • Believe Absolutely Nothing the US Government and Media Say About…Anything
    Glen Ford , BAR executive editor
    Believe Absolutely Nothing the US Government and Media Say About…Anything
    19 Sep 2019
    In any alliance with corporate oppression and militarism, Black America squanders reservoirs of respect among the Earth’s peoples. We betray ourselves and become Black Gringos.
  • Freedom Rider: The Electability Canard
    Margaret Kimberley , BAR editor and senior columnist
    Freedom Rider: The Electability Canard
    18 Sep 2019
    Hapless Joe Biden has always failed in his presidential bids, but is hyped as supremely “electable” this time around because Democratic elites fear and loath Bernie Sanders.
  • Late Stage U.S. Capitalism Fosters Death and Despair, But Can It Foster Class Unity?
    Danny Haiphong , BAR contributor
    Late Stage U.S. Capitalism Fosters Death and Despair, But Can It Foster Class Unity?
    18 Sep 2019
    Self-determination is still an unknown concept to many despite the efforts of the movement for Black lives and related organizations.
  • Black Agenda Report’s 13thAnniversary: An Evening of Information and Inspiration for Liberation, and a Tribute to Co-Founder Bruce Dixon
    BAR staff
    Black Agenda Report’s 13thAnniversary: An Evening of Information and Inspiration for Liberation, and a Tribute to Co-Founder Bruce Dixon
    18 Sep 2019
    https://www.eventbrite.com/e/black-agenda-reports-13th-anniversary-tickets-72333259727
  • Biden and the Black Vote 
    Ann Garrison , BAR contributor
    Biden and the Black Vote 
    18 Sep 2019
    Older Black voters appear to buy into the idea of Biden’s “electability,” a farce engineered by Democratic elites that is likely to give us four more years of Trump.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us