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

F Train Lynching: Papa Cop’s wink and nod
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
08 Jan 2025
🖨️ Print Article
Jordan Neely

I.

Blessed with beautiful voice, and chops for
Moonwalking moving trains. Trains and
train stations his stages, his concert halls.
Smiles, cheers, applause, crowds fed him.

He was 14 when death stole the show—
danced down his youth, his joy.
He was 14 when his Mother—the one he
Loved most—was murdered.

Plasticity of an un-molded mind: PTSD be-
came his dance partner after testifying
at his Mother’s murderer’s trial. He lived with
Aunts between peaks/valleys. Between dances.

II.

Broadway-Lafayette station. Yellow-taped F Train
Car and platform. Organized crime-scene of cruel
Capitalism—
Its rotten ass revealed again International Workers Day!

And Black Lives Matter again. Like cigarette butts on
Minnesota streets; Staten Island sidewalks; back roads
Of Georgia… 1st day of Mental Health Month: Young,
Gifted Black man’s mental health treated on train floor!

And Papa Cop’s ‘plan’ calls for criminalizing
Poverty.  1,000 Vitamin S-fueled badges—
Purging rolling refuge of the unhoused—
‘Sweeping’ flesh and blood ‘trash’ from trains!

Papa Cop’s ‘plan’ calls for never scenting un-ceded Leni-Lenape
Land with sawdust! Never acting Amish—raising roofs! Never
Accenting city noise with Go-Go hammers/screaming saws/re-
Bar-bending/concrete pouring for the poor!

III.

Pentagon groomed; self-deputized; 2nd Amendment-minded
Man—blu gravitational pull toward policing Black bodies.
Killed in Kabul? Baghdad? Tripoli? With impunity? Boarded
Aircraft before farmworkers, teachers, nurses, nannies, cooks?

Chokehold concert? Long white arm of a vigilante: 30-45 seconds…
Stopping blood flow to brain. Unconscious. Bravo! 6-15 minutes…
Dancer’s lean legs flailed.
Life’s last sparks wrung from his hungry, thirsty, limp Black body.

Now’s the time: flip the script! Dish the dirt! Unearth arrests! Let character
Assassination games begin! Paper of record/Fox-box-foot-soldier-scribblers
Weaponize Papa Cop’s words: “He got what was coming to him!” Presto—
Parasitic, avaricious, ethnic-cleansing rentier class views lynching fondly!

IV.

F Train Executioner not charged as denizens of darker hue. Viral video?
Don’t trust your lying eyes! “There are many, many things we don’t know,”
says Papa Cop,
“Allow the investigation to run its course…”

And People of All Seasons: Arab Spring, George Floyd Summer,
Strike-tober, Occupy respond—
Passing shoe leather legislation on tracks—shutting down
Business as usual … Warming our planet with Street Heat!

© 2023. Raymond Nat Turner, The Town Crier. All Rights Reserved.

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.

New York City
Jordan Neely
state repression
state violence

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


Related Stories

Imani Nile
Every Winter, the Bronx Burns
22 October 2025
The cause of the explosion at Mitchel Houses in the South Bronx harkens back to the arson-for-profit schemes of the 1970s that caused
Erica Caines
“Crime”, The Trojan Horse For Colonial Control
24 September 2025
The rhetoric of crime prevention has always served to enforce colonial order.
Anthony Karefa Rogers-Wright
Breaking it Down with Barron: The New York City Mayoral Race, New York City Politics, and a Primer for an Independent Black Revolutionary Polity
30 July 2025
Charles Barron dissects the NYC mayoral race, Mamdani’s struggles with Black voters, and why independent Black radical politics are e
Jon Jeter
Mamdani’s Train is Running But Blacks Wonder if There is Space for Them
02 July 2025
Zohran Mamdani’s democratic socialist vision won NYC’s primary but lost Black voters to scandal-plagued Cuomo by 20 points, exposing the l
Black Alliance For Peace
From George Floyd Back to the Structural Violence of Capitalism
28 May 2025
With the ritualistic murder of George Floyd by the occupation forces referred to as the police that roam the streets and barrios of the Black a
Jon Jeter
The Only Language the White Settler Speaks: Ohio Police Say Grieving Black Father Avenges Son’s Slaying By Killing One of Theirs
07 May 2025
The killing of Timothy Thomas in 2001 ignited Cincinnati’s long-simmering tensions over police violence.
Editors, The Black Agenda Review
ESSAY: Racism and the American University, Addison Gayle, Jr., 1971
16 April 2025
The appraisal of American universities as liberal institutions remains one of the purest examples
Abayomi Azikiwe, Black Agenda Report Contributor
Malcolm X, Black Nationalism and the Cold War
19 February 2025
United States intelligence agencies kept close watch over developments in the African American struggle for freedom, justice, equality and self
JP Sloan
all their deaths were ruled suicide
15 January 2025
for Aiyana, for Tommie, for Jordan
Jon Jeter
From Bernhard Getz to George Zimmerman to Daniel Penny: Using Vigilantes to Police a Racist Social Order
18 December 2024
The state and vigilante lynchings of Black men and boys in the U.S.

More Stories


  • Rodrigo Durão Coelho
    15 million Venezuelans enlist to defend their country amid U.S. threats, says ex-diplomat Carlos Ron
    29 Oct 2025
    He stresses, however, that the atmosphere is not one of panic despite the possibility of military aggression.
  • Pablo Meriguet
    Cuba denounces Trump admin pressuring countries to change their vote against the 62-year US blockade
    29 Oct 2025
    The Cuban foreign minister has stated that, in addition to diplomatic pressure, intimidation has been exerted on certain countries that condemn the economic blockade that Washington has maintained on…
  • Jemima Pierre and Mark Lamont Hill
    Jemima Pierre, BAR Editor and Contributor
    'Leave us alone': Scholar Jemima Pierre on ending Haiti’s foreign occupation
    29 Oct 2025
    As foreign troops, private contractors, and international powers tighten their grip on Haiti, the country is facing one of the worst crises in its modern history. But who is really to blame? On…
  • BAR Radio Logo
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    Black Agenda Radio October 24, 2025
    24 Oct 2025
    In this week’s segment, we focus on Africa. We hear about the Black Alliance for Peace Month of Action Against AFRICOM and about African governments that cooperate with the Trump administration's…
  • Protest in Africa
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    International Month of Action Against AFRICOM
    24 Oct 2025
    Netfa Freeman and Margaret Kimberley are among the Co-Coordinators of the Black Alliance for Peace Africa Team.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us