Sestina: Like

With a nod to Jonah Winter Now we’re all “friends,” there is no love but Like, A semi-demi goddess, something like A reality-TV star look-alike, Named Simile or Me Two. So we like In order to be liked. It isn’t like There’s Love or Hate now. Even plain “dislike” Is frowned on: there’s no button for it. Like Is something you can quantify: each “like” You gather’s almost something money-like, Token of virtual support. “Please like This page to stamp out hunger.” And you’d like To end hunger and climate change alike, But it’s unlikely Like does diddly. Like Just twiddles its unopposing thumbs-ups, like- Wise props up scarecrow silences. “I’m like, So OVER him,” I overhear. “But, like, He doesn’t get it. Like, you know? He’s like It’s all OK. Like I don’t even LIKE Him anymore. Whatever. I’m all like ... ” Take “like” out of our chat, we’d all alike Flounder, agape, gesticulating like A foreign film sans subtitles, fall like Dumb phones to mooted desuetude. Unlike With other crutches, um, when we use “like,” We’re not just buying time on credit: Like Displaces other words; crowds, cuckoo-like, Endangered hatchlings from the nest. (Click “like” If you’re against extinction!) Like is like Invasive zebra mussels, or it’s like Those nutria-things, or kudzu, or belike Redundant fast food franchises, each like (More like) the next. Those poets who dislike Inversions, archaisms, who just like Plain English as she’s spoke — why isn’t “like” Their (literally) every other word? I’d like Us just to admit that’s what real speech is like. But as you like, my friend. Yes, we’re alike, How we pronounce, say, lichen, and dislike Cancer and war. So like this page. Click Like.