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

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


  • Galveston, Texas
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    Black and Latino Voters in Galveston County Texas Fight for Voting Rights
    21 Jun 2024
    Yurij Rudensky joins us to discuss a lawsuit against Galveston County, Texas, brought by Black and Latino residents over its racially discriminatory district map.
  • Close Rikers
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    New York State Fails to Provide Oversight of Jails and Prison
    21 Jun 2024
    Melanie Dominguez joins us to discuss the conditions in New York State jails and prisons and explain why new legislation to expand and strengthen the State Commission of Correction is needed.
  • Black civil war soldiers
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    Why Juneteenth Can Be Problematic
    21 Jun 2024
    Giving Juneteenth the imprimatur of a state stamp of approval makes it problematic, and no longer the people’s holiday it has been for nearly 100 years.
  • Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
    Uncle Sam Wants You, to Kill and Die for the Empire
    19 Jun 2024
    The Biden administration and congress work together in their efforts to secure what they think is U.S. domination. They are playing a dangerous game and now try to bring back a draft through sleight…
  • Editors, The Black Agenda Review
    SERMON: The “Pet Negro” System, Zora Neale Hurston, 1943
    19 Jun 2024
    Zora Neale Hurston’s sermon on the “Pet Negro” system provides devastating and timely insight into the psychology of Black folk working in the service of white power. Preach, Sister Zora!
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us