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


  • South Carolina Wants to Silence Inmates at Troubled Prison
    Nellie Bailey and Glen Ford
    South Carolina Wants to Silence Inmates at Troubled Prison
    24 Apr 2018
    “Brothers are going to find a way to communicate with the outside, and they will no longer tolerate the kind of human rights abuses that previous generations experienced,” said longtime prisoner ri
  • Durham NC Bans Police Exchanges With Israel
    Nellie Bailey and Glen Ford
    Durham NC Bans Police Exchanges With Israel
    24 Apr 2018
    A ten-group coalition won unanimous passage of a bill prohibiting the Durham police department from exchanges of training or information with Israel -- the first city in the U.S. to do so.
  • Corporate Media “Could Care Less” About International Law
    Kyle Fraser , Black Agenda Radio producer
    Corporate Media “Could Care Less” About International Law
    24 Apr 2018
    University of Illinois professor of international law Dr. Francis Boyle said the illegality of U.S. attacks against Syria and occupation of its territory is a non-issue for U.S.
  • Kiilu Nyasha
    Raymond Nat Turner , BAR poet-in-residence
    For Sistar Kiilu Nyasha: Freedom Is A Constant Struggle…
    19 Apr 2018
    Never thought I’d see the day that I’d pray for: Fake News; Never thought I’d see the day that I’d pray for: Alternative Facts from Boss Tweet— pray that
  • White Lies and Black Disbelief in a Fading Empire
    Glen Ford , BAR executive editor
    White Lies and Black Disbelief in a Fading Empire
    18 Apr 2018
    “What would prevent Russia from attacking the United States because of all the people that the United States is killing in our communities.”
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us