While America Watches Game of Thrones
by James Croal Jackson

 
We make a mess with Strawberry Jell-O. We lick 
powder off our fingers and drink dark pink syrup 

before it sets. I like it more when it is liquid, 
less so when it is blob. We stir and pour it 

in a bowl of ice and wait for it to firm up 
like our lives that never do. We don’t care 

for the show everyone is watching, full of kings 
and blood when all we can think of is politics.

We have our own red pool inside the fridge,
and something is wrong– it never thickens.

In the morning, it remains the same, sitting 
in a vat of our own dread. Sugar, sugar, 

sugar, sugar, sugar, sugar, sugar. That’s all 
we get. And news that makes us sick.