by BAR poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner
The first full week of the Trumpacolypse behind us, our poet consults the ancestors...
Ancestral Thoughts, Aloud…
by BAR poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner
Grateful
catching snow cone cars crawling up St. Nic…
Eyelid levees breached by hot tears
Flowing with WBAI evening news
This storm and stress period…
Thinking out loud how
Robert Knight might be writing
Reports into tiny morning hours—
“the Knight has a thousand eyes…”
Thinking out loud how
Pete Seeger, well worn voice, metallic twanging
banjo strings might ‘kettle’ ten thousand of us,
singing just octaves below the better world in birth
Thinking out loud how
Amiri Baraka might split our sides showing
No regard for Beauregard, his Cheeto Bandito boss,
and bottom-feeders drained from the swamp—
A Low Coup, or Who coup upped Amerikkka?
Thinking out loud how
Jayne Cortez might drill marching women:
“Find your own voice, use your own voice;
Find your own voice, use your own voice…” in
Independent politics denouncing Dem body snatchers
looking through the women into 2018—seeing 2020…
Thinking out loud how
Michael Ratner might give
Litigation Sensation to any administration—
Filing fifteen suits—one for every day
Boss Tweet/$cammany Haul have
Occupied the offal office, stonewalled hearings on
capitalist hill and recklessly eyeballed the
white supreme court with bloodshot eyes
Thinking out loud how
cranky Odetta might be ‘bout “Jim Crow Blues”
But, singing it, steeling us and casting a spell
on the apprentice devil, foppish Führer
Thinking out loud how
the Zinn master might remind those tired of
Traveling by mule that they can’t
“be neutral on a moving train”
Friendship Train, solidarity train
Thinking out loud how
Oscar Brown, Jr.’s demand for:
“40 Acres and A Mule” might go well with
Single-payer—or, how he might just call
Tomfoolery of Price, “Bullshit!”
Thinking out loud how
an Abbey Lincoln release from tension—
“I Got Some People In Me”
A Kleenex-snatching “Down Here Below”
”Brother Can You Spare A Dime” might
Steel our spirits for class war—and
Thinking out loud how
Confucius might say,
“Man who grab pussy, turn Tiger loose…”
Raymond Nat Turner (c) 2017 All Rights Reserved
Raymond Nat Turner is an acclaimed poet and performance artist. Find much more of his work at http://upsurgejazz.com
Orisanmi Burton is an assistant professor at American University’s Department of Anthropology.
Shannon Jones is a member of the Spirit of Mandela’s Peoples' Senate Coordinating Committee.
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