Chop Shop

In a language no one
has ever learned to speak fluently,
the word for “chop shop”
is “America.”

No matter where the chop shop is located
the operation is the same:
steal a vehicle; rip it apart;
sell the pieces to people

who put them in their own vehicles
and drive to places they want to go.
The parts work fine. They don’t care
who’s driving, or that the vehicle

is not their homeland.
It’s the victims of the theft
who raise hell about it. After a time
they get another vehicle,

which may or may not be stolen again.
If it is, they may take the bus from then on
and sit next to others who have
no vehicle of their own.

In that same language, the word for peace
is “revolver” and it is used as a synonym
for “justice.” “Justice” is pronounced
“America” as well. You would think

this would be confusing, but the language
doesn’t care about the speakers who mix the words up
and most people get along fine, or think they do,
since no one is fluent in the tongue anyway.

This language, suprisingly, has no
written alphabet. There is no literature
and there are no schoolbooks to teach it. All knowledge is assumed to be
common to all, and when a disagreement arises

about usage or grammar, arbiters send the dissenter
to America and suggest that justice has been done.
(The word for “arbiters” is unpronounceable
and is only thought, never spoken aloud,

not even incorrectly.) There are millions of native speakers of this tongue
who cannot discuss anything with each other.
The language doesn’t care about them. Someday,
they will vanish on the highway to the next terminal.