I got one in my inbox the other morning: a friendly reminder that my Verizon wireless bill is past due. Like I don’t know. The company has texted me every morning since the due date at approximately 8:47 to set up a payment plan. • kind of maybe actually a bit really probably just • pennies rust in the fountain … we wish for winter’s end • I was a kid in the 80s. Mom worked part-time at the deli downtown near the corner of Front and Grove, the counters lined with plastic towers that dispensed nickel-candies we weren’t allowed to touch. She stashed us in a rear aisle, tucked with our school books behind bulk-packages of Bounty paper towels. Sometimes the stock guy Anthony hooked us up with one of the fat dill pickles that swam in glass gallon jars, peppercorns settled in brine. They each cost 25¢. • Seven months = the number of additional months it will take me to earn what my white male counterpart earned in total last year. — Economic Policy Institute, July 2017 • Flowers wait for me at the reception desk. [?] • “Regularly updating your passwords can help prevent: hacked accounts, identity theft, stolen money or unauthorized charges. Here’s what we suggest: Use a different password for each account. That way, if it gets stolen — either from you or one of the sites where you use it — someone won’t be able to take over all of your accounts. Get creative. Mix letters, numbers, and special characters. Never use your name or birthdate. Use 12 characters if you can, but no less than 10. The longer the password, the tougher it is to crack.” — Federal Trade Commission • If you are unable to make this appointment … • Above her office desk, my college advisor mounted a framed poster of a slave ship hold, bodies lined up head-to-foot like matchsticks in a box ready to ignite. For months, I crept into her office, essays in hand seeking her advice. Under the weight of the odor of old wood one rainy afternoon, I asked her, “Why?” She sighed put down her pen, “Because we can’t forget.” • “School shootings are still rare. More kids are killed walking to school.” — Matt Vespa, Feb. 22, 2018, Townhall (conservative news and political commentary) • “We’re all getting along right now,” she tells me. I need to remember that. She tells me that too. • the last warning — shriveled orchid petals fall one by one • It’s not supposed to be easy for you.

Poets Resist is published by Glass Poetry Press.
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