I watch the flag to see if it’s dropping
if I have missed something in the
universal split second of my mid-morning walk:
if tragedy has wormed its way into the still crisp air,
if the dew that forms rain drops that rest atop blades of grass
became another shitty metaphor
for tears permanently rooted to the earth, or
for the land that never gets to stop crying.
I watch the flag on its pole exist as a sliding scale
that starts at afraid and moves down to more afraid and
down still to everything now lost and down further
to everything now buried.
A country, a collective whole
held to a system where violence,
death and senselessness
wear us like a well-fitted suit,
one that’s adjusting its tie
just right outside of our peripheral vision,
one that tailors itself to the reaction, the ends, the means
with a quiet precision in the hemming of our heart break
until our hearts forget how to break or
until they have just gotten used to it.