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

Managers
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
01 Mar 2023
🖨️ Print Article
Managers
Mayors Eric Adams of New York, Karen Bass of Los Angeles, Lori Lightfoot of Chicago, and Sylvester Turner of Houston. (NY Times photographers An Rong Xu, Erin Schaff, Akilah Townsend, Michael Starghill Jr.)

                                                                                                        Managers

 

Pomp and circumstance! Praise Dancing

precarity!

Knighting ‘em ‘enlightened,’ ‘progressive!’

Crowning ‘em ‘reformers!’

Or, tagging ‘em transparent Bassackwards

Tribesmen like Strong-arm Williams.

Like Thom-ass Clarence. Like Raytheon’s

Raven. Like woke Drone Ranger—Or

Calling ‘em/her/they/them…Big Mama or

Tiny Tim…

Color ‘em music stand black, mocha

expresso, high yellow, or coco brown…

Tag ‘em BIPOC, Hip Hop, Homegrown,

Transgender, Disabled, with two PhDs!

Pronouns We The People! Names like:

Martin Lou Harriet Douglass X III!

Still the ship of state stays its course…

Can’t turn on a dime—can’t reverse itself!

They’ll check hip boxes—

Coronating them President, Police Chief,

Mayor, White Supreme Court justice,

Capitalist Hill careerist, Governor, Warden…

but be ‘bout the business of business. Remote

controlled, battery-operated, omnidirectional—

Intersectional instruments of corporate class rule.

State apparatus—still coming at us!

Supervising sweeps of howling belly, cupped hand

Encampments. Sweeping ‘em under rugs of the rich.

Sweeping crumpled signs/crossed red lines up into

Gun towers/grey bars concertina wired to Wall Street;

Managing misery in capital’s tilted table, thumb on scale,

loaded dice casino; Where even the Race Card’s

marked…



© 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.

Black Face in High Place

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


Related Stories

Musings from the Margins #2: From Atlanta and Haiti, to Niger, the Western War Against Africans and Collective Humanity Intensifies
​​​​​​​ Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor and columnist
Musings from the Margins #2: From Atlanta and Haiti, to Niger, the Western War Against Africans and Collective Humanity Intensifies
09 August 2023
The war against Africans intensifies, the puppets and stooges do as they are ordered, while others are satisfied with empty gestures.
The Super Bowl and the Trouble with First Black Symbolism
Gus Griffin
The Super Bowl and the Trouble with First Black Symbolism
08 February 2023
Whether Super Bowl quarterbacks, or presidents, or police chiefs, unquestioned admiration of the "first Black" should come to an end.
Laboring Beyond Black Representation
Too Black
Laboring Beyond Black Representation
06 April 2022
The allure of Black representation in high places can be very dangerous.
Elections and the Illusion of Black Political Power
Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
Elections and the Illusion of Black Political Power
03 November 2021
Black politicians may be openly conservative or pretend leftists but their constituents rarely get what they need.

More Stories


  • BAR Radio Logo
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    Black Agenda Radio April 17, 2026
    17 Apr 2026
    In this week’s segment, we have an update on the US/Israeli war of aggression against Iran from a journalist reporting from Iran. But we begin with two organizers of the Pan-Africanism Summit Against…
  • Pan-African Summit Against Imperialism
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    Pan-Africanism Summit Against Imperialism
    17 Apr 2026
    The Pan-Africanism Summit Against Imperialism (PASAI) will be held on May 11 and May 12 in Nairobi, Kenya. It is organized as a counter-summit to the France-Africa summit taking place in Nairobi at…
  • The Colony Archive
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    Journalist Navid Zarinnal Reports from Iran
    17 Apr 2026
    Navid Zarrinnal is an Iranian journalist and host of The Colony Archive podcast. He joins us again from Iran to discuss the fragile "cease fire," Trump's threats, the Strait of Hormuz, and how Iran's…
  • Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
    Trump, Jesus, and White Supremacy
    15 Apr 2026
    Beliefs in white supremacy and manifest destiny are at the heart of Donald Trump’s actions and his appeal to millions of people.
  • Editors, The Black Agenda Review
    ESSAY: Zionist Logic, Malcolm X, 1964
    15 Apr 2026
    “The ever-scheming European imperialists wisely placed Israel where she could geographically divide the Arab world…and also divide the Africans against the Asians.”
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us