WHEEL OF FORTUNE

 by Mary K O’Melveny

“Vaccine Wheel of Fortune” by JMbucholtz at Deviant Art.

               In the Circle of Life

                    It's the wheel of fortune

                    It's the leap of faith

                    It's the band of hope

                    Till we find our place…

—“The Circle of Life” (Lyrics by Tim Rice)

No one wants to be the last woman down before the cure.

So everyone is staring at computer screens, leaning into

laptops, cradling cell phones. Legions of faithful vaccine

seekers are as determined as El Camino de Santiago pilgrims.

Or would-be buyers of Hamilton tickets back when Broadway

was still open.  There are waiting lists, rumors, promises.

Appointments made, then cancelled. Lines form, disband.

Recorded messages say don’t call us, we’ll call you.

 

Everyone is at risk. But not enough to be advanced to more

fortunate categories. We reside in data bases far and wide.

We’ve filled out forms as if they were lottery tickets, sent

every scrap of personal data to would-be hackers around

the globe, called doctors we’ve not seen in years, even searched

for fake college IDs that might jump us to new age brackets.

Some neighbors raced to appointments in neighborhoods they

had never seen, forgetting who the odds had already disfavored.

 

As usual, the privileged see serendipity. Everyone else

knows how often the game is rigged. Kismet is a figment.

The carnival barker is gone but his fabrications linger

like smoke from a cheap cigar. Even as chilled vials traverse

the highways like pilgrim caravans, new viral strains mutate,

shapeshift. Before all our waiting arms are raised, half a million

will likely die. So we click and call and cry for our chance

at good fortune. Once again, Lady Luck smiles, then disappoints.

Mary K O'Melveny is a recently retired labor rights attorney who lives in Washington DC and Woodstock NY.  Her work has appeared in various print and on-line journals. Her first poetry chapbook A Woman of a Certain Age is available from Finishing Line Press. Mary’s poetry collection Merging Star Hypotheses was published by Finishing Line Press in January, 2020.

THE ELECTION IS RIGGED

by Llyn Clague





THE ELECTION IS RIGGED
blares the hand-painted sign beside the road
for every passing 4X4, SUV, BMW.

THE ELECTION IS
RIGGED—a neighbor, living on my street,
screams scam!  Every time I pass,
scam! . . . scam! . . . scam! . . .

Man—I want to say—
you don’t even know me
and you insist we cannot play fair.

THE ELECTION, you cry, IS RIGGED
even before the first whistle
in the raucous, unruly, Saturday-celebrating stadium.

2

Remember the games we played as kids?
Throw an elbow, give a furtive kick, scratch—
sure, we wanted to win.
But, say it aloud or not,
we knew, victory “earned” by cheating
was a sham.

THE ELECTION IS RIGGED
Have the adults, in their games, lost
what we had as kids?
Are the rewards so rich,
they’re willing to “win” at any cost?

And you, neighbor, before you roar . . . RIGGED
to every passing semi, RV, antique classic,
don’t you realize, if you are right,
our entire American “democracy”
is a sham?

Of course you do.
Out of the many, there is no shazam,
no will of the governed,
no “voice of the people.”

No voice of you and me.

3

THE ELECTION IS RIGGED
And maybe, my neighbor down the street,
whom I don’t know, you are right—THE ELECTION
IS RIGGED, though maybe not
how you think.

Nobody is bribing the refs,
nor paying off rogue players in the stadium.

Long before the soft whistle
in the teeth of the first volunteer
opening the precinct door,
all across this wide continent
federal, state, and local elections
ARE being rigged—

by precise gerrymandering,
by particular ID cards,
by cascades of designated cash.

RIGGED, at the very least,
to the very best of their manipulative ability,
by our election-selecteds
and their precise, particular, dedicated minions.

You grieve me, neighbor, living on our street,
screaming at every passerby
THE ELECTION IS RIGGED,
not because you are wrong,
but because you may be right.

And if you are, in the stampede
after the shout of Fire! in our national theater,
we will be crushed, you and I together.

Llyn Clague is a poet based in Hastings-on-Hudson, NY.  His poems have been published widely, including in Ibbetson Street, Atlanta Review, Wisconsin Review, California Quarterly, Main Street Rag, New York Quarterly.  His seventh book Hard-Edged and Childlike was published by Main Street Rag in September, 2014.