Against the Bombing of Iran: Death Metal Music As Resistance by Dee Allen

On June 22, 2025 (GMT+3:30) the Trump Administration utilized the United States Air Force and Navy to attack three Iranian nuclear facilities in an operation called "Midnight Hammer". Trump gave a short address after this strike at 10 pm EST (2:00 am GMT). Immediately after the televised statement, Trump posted on Truth Social in all caps saying that "Any retaliation by Iran against the United States of America will be met with force far greater than what was witnessed tonight."

In response to this operation, The Catalyst launched a flash submission campaign against the bombing of Iran and destruction of the SWANA region at large by the United States to be published on July 4th. This publication day deliberately coincides with the day the United States celebrates Independence Day—a federal holiday commemorating the adoption of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776. The included work in this campaign questions and disrupts the ideology of American Exceptionalism at the expense of Black and Brown lives globally. 

No one is free until all of us are free.

DOMINATE [ SONG-LYRICS ]

The police and the military

Act together as one


Out to summarily subdue us

Under the rule of their guns


Heinous acts of brutality

Enable us to emerge and resist


Ready to unite, ready to fight

For our human right to exist


CHORUS 1:

To control the battlescape,

They move to dominate [ TWICE ]


Us
All!


Sharp blows shatter bank windows

And it's not because leaders are weak


May this economy pay the cost

From the havoc we wreak


Convergence at the gates

Of kakistocratic power


All their shock-troops, all their weapons

Deliver our darkest hour


[ REPEAT CHORUS 1 ]

Crush some

But more will come


And bring an end

To this racist kingdom!


CHORUS 2:

We'll reclaim the battlescape

So none will dominate [ TWICE ]

Us

All!

The breaking point finally reached

For hatred instituted

All lives can't matter unless

All Black lives are included

Written: 6.24.2020

[ For Darryl Lamont Jenkins and Lacy MacAuley. ]

Dee Allen is an African-Italian performance poet based in Oakland, California. Active on creative writing & Spoken Word since the early 1990s. Author of 10 books--Boneyard, Unwritten Law, Stormwater, Skeletal Black, Elohi Unitsi, Rusty Gallows: Passages Against Hate, Plans, Crimson Stain, Discovery and his newest, The Mansion--and 81 anthology appearances under his figurative belt so far.