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

Ruchell Magee Must Be Set Free!
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
26 Jul 2023
🖨️ Print Article

Ruchell Magee Must Be Set Free! 

Elder, brother, comrade…Been gone 

too long…

Wanted in the Black Community—

Watts writ large!

 

If 1619 started it—ebony/ivory—

teenage attraction 

Jim Crow’s watch—upped the ante!

Deep South apartheid stench/Emmett

Till terror/Pitched battles on blood rivers…

What could the boy be but Black rapist?

 

Bullwhip warped minds of white men— 

What could this be but ‘Master’s’

midnight visits to slave quarters—Prying

apart Black thighs—overruling cries, pleas,  

Love?

What could the boy be but Black rapist?

 

Crackers coveted Choctaw land—

Black soil mattered…

More than visiting terror—or

Another muddy, mutilated body in Mississippi

or another Dixie river. Crackers coveting

Choctaw land put the boy in his plantation place… 

 

Crackers coveting Choctaw land gifted 8 Angola yrs,

Under horseback-ridin, shot-gun-totin, tobacco-spittin

gaze; Under King Cotton’s rule; Gifted target embroidered

Jacket— Gifted exile to: City of Angels/ruled by devils…

 

Elder, brother, comrade…Been gone 

too long…

Wanted in the Black Community—

Watts writ large!

 

His numbers are no longer:

“6-3-4-5-7-8-9”

no longer:

“Beechwood 4-5-7-8-9” 

far too long his numbers been:

#A92051 #T115— 83—Caged since ’63—

60 yrs of vengeance-driven torture!

 

Elder, brother, comrade…Been gone 

too long…

Wanted in the Black Community—

Watts writ large!

 

Visualize him home—sun splashing light comic 

book bright colors of L.A. murals!

Visualize him home, pulling three-deep lines snaked 

‘round crooked corners…holding youth centers, senior

centers, libraries, bookstores captive.

Visualize him home—space, light, air, freedom to stretch 

out in sensory overload!

 

Elder, brother, comrade…Been gone 

too long…

Wanted in the Black Community—

Watts writ large!

 

No mo’ Golden State gulag/COVID 

concentration camp—

No mo’ Octogenarian barrister behind bars

law book-lifting—iron-pumping mind:

 

No mo’ memoranda, motion, writ and plea

No mo’ heroic, litigious—War of the Flea—

No mo’ symbol of strength/wisdom of tree—

People, Ruchell Magee must be set Free!

Governor, Ruchell Magee must be set Free!

People, Ruchell Magee must be set Free!

 

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



 

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


More Stories


  • Kim Ives
    Trump Administration Seeks to Remove Constraints from and Secure UN Funding for a New Proxy Force in Haiti
    01 Oct 2025
    The empire has a new plan for Haiti, a return to military occupation dressed up as humanitarianism. Like past occupations, it will only increase the suffering of Haiti's people.
  • Hanna Eid
    Recognizing the Palestinian 'State': A Colonial Hauntology
    01 Oct 2025
    While Gaza burns, a collaborationist class is being handed the keys to a prison and calling it a state, all in service to western imperialism.
  • Bikrum Gill
    Orders of Sovereignty: Internal Power and External Dependency in the Recognition of the State of Palestine
    01 Oct 2025
    Western nations complicit in occupation and genocide offer a fig leaf of sovereignty by recognizing a Palestinian state that in reality would still be occupied.
  • BAR Radio Logo
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    Black Agenda Radio September 26, 2025
    26 Sep 2025
    In this week’s segment we discuss the need for self-defense against racist, white supremacist forces. But first we hear about efforts to Build and Fight through a solidarity economy, self-…
  • The Build and Fight Formula
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    The Build and Fight Formula
    26 Sep 2025
    Our guest is Kali Akuno, co-founder and director of Cooperation Jackson in Jackson, Mississippi. He joins us from New York to discuss the Build and Fight Formula, its work with the Peoples Network…
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us