Walkers
The people who live out here call them walkers:
median shufflers, dollar store loiterers
peek-a-booing through closed driver side windows
as the rest of us shuttle, blindered, chastened
across the desiccated heartland.
Look! One’s ahead, arm thrust out like a ship’s prow,
staggering windward, squeezing an old iPhone,
drawn forward, I guess, in search of a Signal,
eyes elevated, straining toward reverence.
I used to pitch lines to you: the Great (ugh) Outdoors,
drop Kerouac’s name, talk about the Roma,
“Look closer, at the shoes,” you’d say, “or at the teeth –
always the teeth, whenever they smile at you.”
Now I lean toward the wheel, accelerating.
• • •
Mark Silcox was born and raised in Toronto, Canada and currently lives just outside of Oklahoma City, where he a teaches Philosophy at the University of Central Oklahoma. He has published four books of philosophy and his stories and poems have appeared in The Ivo Review, Polar Borealis, the New English Review, and Cosmic Roots & Eldritch Shores, among other venues. More information is available at marksilcox.net.