after the Highland Park Shooting on July 4^th

I feel safe
nowhere at all.
Not in my tiny tin home.

Not driving through town–
bleached storefronts, red caps,
flags waving blue lives ahead.

Not hiking through the forest,
camouflaged a target,
deer lurking, hunters licensed
and hungry for a kill.

They claim the fear of bullets
is a fear of the human
who commands them.

As far as I can see
the woods house no humans
but I have no service to search
how far an eye can see,
how fast a bullet can travel,
how many people would hate us
if they knew us well enough.

All night we listen to the fireworks
and wonder if they are fireworks.
In the state we just left,
they were not.

We are 712 miles safer
but 50 feet closer
to the nearest gun shop,
one wrong stop from becoming
the next soon-forgotten statistic.

We are barreling down
another highway, pulling
our trailer like a shell
as if we have a shot
at outrunning it.

We are gunning it past
small towns, big cities.
Shrouded by mountains,
backyard revolving,
heart racing through
the flatlands, a clear shot.

Jen Gayda Gupta lives, writes, and travels in a tiny camper with her husband and their dog. Her work has been published in Rattle, Up the Staircase Quarterly, Sky Island Journal, Pine Hills Review, The Shore and others. You can find her @jengaydagupta and jengaydagupta.com.