America Plays BINGO
Mikal Wix
I hear them preach divine randomness
of wildfire, hurricane, border patrol, “B-9”
———I fear they won’t fade away now,
———shamed by old, blackened trees,
or steel slats of high Texas walls, “N-33”
I see them praise youth, who offer
———a future of men in jumpsuits “I-88”
———long, red neckties, cling to prison,
church, a gray house, how they say “O-69”
they have more experience than children
———locked in cages, blame and pervert “B-2”
———who harbors data on vaccines,
climate migration, satellite imaging
of the Darién Gap, because, they say, “I-10”
———it’s not about coyotes versus
———traffickers, or if brown bodies ask
to be taken north, but instead, they say, “O-56”
it’s chasing pyrite, how each bus
———or train that we jump to flee “G-8”
———the Sonoran is pointless, deadly,
they say, risks life to try for more
when energy is best spent staying
———in a country that devours “N-22”
———us like quail, but blindly certain
having assured others, to unbox, “O-19”
resurrect the trebuchet, the guillotine
———because, they say, forget “B-13”
———stories from margins, shrug,
do nothing to help wildlings “G-14”
unhoused, their actions fueled
———by voices giving sermon “O-85”
———randomness of wildfire, hurricane,
border patrol, worry not, they say,
it’s quieter down at the end “N-60”
———of the dirt road, where home
———is another four-letter word,
like fire, like wind, “I-4” hope,
gone … “BINGO!”
Mikal Wix, a Queer writer and literary worker, has been featured in literary journals such as Pleiades, North American Review, Sonora Review, River Heron Review, Portland Review, and Pinch Journal. He serves as poetry editor at West Trade Review, and his work can be found here: https://linktr.ee/mikalwix
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