Like

—after A.Van Jordan

preposition. 1: similar to: Because there has to be an easier way of knowing, than knowing, like reading the Times or the bones, like distant sirens that sound like black women screaming or sopranos singing into the night. Because there must be a better way of understanding than experiencing—like. So when you ask what it is similar to, the answer is close enough. It is like the beat cops I saw turned shades chasing down black boys in Michigan, like if you can’t join them beat them, like a feverish Indiana night, a horde glittered with sweat ready to lynch two men and feast their eyes, like locusts swarming a field of grain as gold as youth. It is like the waters of hurricane Harvey subsuming Houston streets, like wildfires consuming homes in California, the shadows of prisoners stretching before the eyes, like a hard way to realize there aren’t enough fire fighters. Otherwise it is like an epidemic, opioid, oblique, like a flash mob but the dance is deportation, but a trans woman in Dallas is the vehicle they attempt to tip, like a scale, like Russian bots peddling misinformation until one becomes a hit, goes viral, each shared clip garnering another like, like: like, like, like.