What was I to do
in the middle of the night
when the men came knocking hard
wearing starched black uniforms
with small red patches
as if they, like real soldiers
were deserving of medals for bravery
or at the least for staying alive
and now they were staying here
although I did not know them
and they did not explain
but merely looked at me curiously
as one would look at a stray cat
still I needed to relieve myself
but did not quite believe
these men in black were as benign
as they seemed to think
we thought they were
the problem was I did not wish
to wake my parents for the
tension in the house was like
wet plaster
and the only other bathroom
was on the bottom floor
which the men had commandeered
to establish a command post where
brittle new machines
cackling like old hens spat out information
and I heard names -
Jose and Jorge and Juan
Juanita and Carmen and Belinda
names of friends and relatives
and talk of fences and walls and
barbed wire
then at last I cried myself to sleep
'til just before the sun arose
when the men in black
got up to pee
their laughter muted, voices garbled
insinuations deadly as they bragged how
they had Trumped us and what would happen
if we were to try to flee.
Copyright © 2017 by Lowell A. Anderson. All rights reserved.
Note: This poem was cross-posted to Ocala, Central Florida and Beyond.
