we’ve been poking ourselves,
or the ghost we call self.
(first, with no fist, no force,
just the hollow hum
of who’s poking who?)
we poke anything we touch,
anything we want,
under the will of the no-thing
or the collective crammed into
the one percent they call god.
(zeus? a footnote.
venus? a flickering pixel.)
quarks poke quarks.
atoms buzz against atoms.
heart cells throb to other heart cells.
viruses hijack the shadows
of ordinary days.
organism to organism,
we are poking.
we poke the living,
the dead,
the art,
the libre chaos,
the startups,
the comedians,
the jokers,
the ones who can’t stop
tiktoking their lives into emoji graves.
(including:
the priest troubleshooting salvation,
the fedex driver scanning addresses
with laser eyes and a tired sigh.
each delivery a poke,
each poke a small death.)
i’m not saying i hate it.
this ancient rhythm,
this infernal machine
where poking is just poking:
the universe’s oldest joke,
told in the dark,
again and again,
to no one.
so,
keep poking
with a chin raised small but tall.
or don’t.
the joke is the same either way.
i day of silence must be
a day with no poking,
no horn pushing ups,
and no car beeping.
an emoji is only poking at the noise.
silence does not poke,
cause,
it does not speak at all.