Wednesday, July 10, 2024

WHEEL OF FORTUNE

After everyone who smiles 
when they say your name 
has died—

after every false 
prophet out there
eye-witness-testifies—

after the government 
files are 
declassified 

and you learn, 
as the tide turns, 

that God 
was never 
on your side—then 

you might know 
how the horror film 
heroine feels: 

like the black hole 
at the center 
of the universe,

or the last one 
which vicissitude has 
deigned to leave alive—

not out of grace 
or compassion, 
but as a plot line—

as test of her capacity 
to look head-on
at the epiphany 

as it dawns 
in her mind that, 
this whole time, 

the calls have been 
coming from inside.