AFTER-SCHOOL REALITY TELEVISION

 

they’re out roving again

among the steel beam firs

seeking a real moss forest

or anywhere else without watchers

 

there’s nowhere silent left now

except headphones and screens

nowhere private and unseen

except for somebody’s blocked list

 

there’s nowhere free to be

maybe a beach or park

to loiter on or off a bus line

 

faux news facepalms and says these kids are plastic

only caricatures only cardboard only screen-mediated

only diffuse long-forgotten SNL characters and rude cartoons

reproducing duplicates in 3D printing through cultural osmosis

 

but as I watch them swapping Pokemon at the corner-store gym

lingering just long enough to live while the streetlight camera takes note

I wonder what necessary hardness is provided by falsity

what fictile smile would armor my own young teeth