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

Circus on Capitalist Hill (Comey don’t play that…)
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
13 Jun 2017
🖨️ Print Article

by BAR poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner

Big doings this week up there between the War House and the Rogues Garden. Our poet reports on the show, clowns, cloven hooves and all.

 

Circus on Capitalist Hill (Comey don’t play that…)

by BAR poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner

A senile clown questions the wind
Hearing what he’s heard
hundreds of times before:
Step right up, ladies and gentlemen
into the smoke and
mirror swamp, draining
Anything not nailed down

Step right up, ladies and gentlemen
to sideshow puppetry
Millionaire-billionaire buffoonery
Crooked clowns hiding behind corkscrews
Conniving clowns with
cloven hooves and horns
turning fruits of our labor
into ATMs

Step right up, ladies and gentlemen
suspend disbelief,
Don’t follow the money
pay No attention to
1% pickpockets
Working the perimeter

Step right up, ladies and gentlemen
enter the Capitalist Hill,
War House, Rogue Garden,
Offal Office, White
Supreme Court matrix—
Big Top, bleaching brains,
fooling fools and babies
Riding bareback and backwards
on donkeys and elephants
Babbling ‘bout “our democracy”

Step right up, ladies and gentlemen
See the greatest show on turf
pebbles posing as diamonds,
Fascism as ‘democracy’
with redacted rights…

Step right up, ladies and gentlemen
See the clown trick
Un-framing, freeing an Indigenous
Warrior caged four decades

Step right up, ladies and gentlemen
See the clown trick
sliding cells open pneumatically,
Freeing COINTELPRO, Black Power
political prisoners, prisoners of war—

“I didn’t think so— Comey don’t play that…”

Raymond Nat Turner © 2017 All Rights Reserved
Raymond Nat Turndr is an acclaimed poet and performance artist. find much more of his work at http://upsurgejazz.com.

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


More Stories


  • The Injustice of This Moment Is Not an "Aberration"
    Michelle Alexander
    The Injustice of This Moment Is Not an "Aberration"
    22 Jan 2020
    Yes, Trump is an inveterate liar, but American politicians have always told lies about the Black and brown people they demonize and mass-imprison.
  • Venezuela: A Successful Year of Resistance
    Francisco Dominguez
    Venezuela: A Successful Year of Resistance
    22 Jan 2020
    Washington’s strategy throughout 2019 was aimed at bringing about chaos and mayhem sufficient to justify US military intervention. 
  • In Anti-Communist Fervor, FBI Built a 500-Page File on Coretta Scott King
    Aaron J. Leonard
    In Anti-Communist Fervor, FBI Built a 500-Page File on Coretta Scott King
    22 Jan 2020
    Scott King was spied on constantly by the FBI – surveillance that was authorized by the Kings’ “friends,” the Kennedy brothers.
  • Huey P. Newton and Martin Luther King Jr.: Revolutionary Love and Unity
    Archishman Raju
    Huey P. Newton and Martin Luther King Jr.: Revolutionary Love and Unity
    22 Jan 2020
    Both Newton and King sought to create a united front for peace and socialism.
  • Want Out of Jail? First You Have to Take a Fast Food Job
    Anna Wolfe and Michelle Liu
    Want Out of Jail? First You Have to Take a Fast Food Job
    22 Jan 2020
    The convict labor system was once notorious in Mississippi – and it still is, under the guise of debt restitution.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us