Fashionably Too Late

(inspiration: this article)

It’s best that bull’s-eyes

stay pixelated,

not painted onto tangible targets –

wooden, shaped like black hollow hoodies

with a pack of skittles up one sleeve

and a threatening bottle of iced tea in the other  –

kept at a distance

that you choose.

It’s different in this dimension –

this isn’t a video game.

You can’t just stop

push the plastic button

under your thumb

take those shots back,

reload.

Here, on sidewalks you can feel

under your walking feet,

bullets fire

get lodged

and stay

in wood, in bone,

in flesh,

in memories –

and it’s not romantic nostalgia.

It’s crimson pooling at your feet.

It’s a pair of rolling eyes flashing white.

It’s the wetness of tears in winter air.

It’s angry cries, it’s sniffling pleas –

some last loud and long

and the silent ones

blare only with helpless frowns,

endlessly.

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