This is the border simulator

Gabriel Dozal

user’s manual/how-to Try crossing out the word simulator then take out the border You see the border you want to see You’re separate from those you call them They’re simulated versions of yourself Who patrols our thoughts at night You know the ones that get across

################# They’re better suited for Mexico anyways *

In the border simulator you are the gift and you are the giver of a wall between what you accept

and won’t let pass The border changes perceptions so it’s a tricky cross south to the land of they-have-the-papers You can’t carve away or be separate from those you call them They’re simulated versions of yourself north of the X where you pass The border exists because people walk over

It’s defined by those that cross Outsiders think they shape it and they do

bind/separate

Cause some need to bind to be separate

* Simulator you become the gift and the giver

when there are too many people crossing In reality custom brokers are overwhelmed with manifiestos where you get tax back in exchange for proof the goods have rebounded south

but in simulation manifiestos are the transporting of farm hands They help you gesso and line up the words ¿Esos son Reebok o son Nike? on the border wall

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Border is hiding/showing vulnerability because it wants you among all the hybrid borders in this room you’re the border border dreamed as a certain grid but it’s a simulation We wouldn’t want it to keep going cause then we’d be navigating

New Mexico retelling the time we saw My Life

With the Thrill Kill Kult A fence of constant translation

The border of arrow never-erring #####################

In this simulation you don’t need to think about identity because everyone is bordered

by the phrase #You speak with an accent but don’t think in one

You’re unsure of your accent Outside of the border you’re told you have one You’ve lived here your whole life so you’re not sure#

#Your Uncle Frankie Fernandez helped build the W fence in 2007 They were paying $20 an hour to mesh the fence with the imaginary border He needed the money

The simulator didn’t notice it was already happening

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Draw a picture of a family negotiating the border between themselves and their family in Mexico Slip it into the mesh of the border fence#

Sega Nintendo / super genesis ######################

Nationalism in the border simulator

In the border simulator you spend all day with the Salvis who’ve crossed/made it past Talk about how hormonas in pollo make güeros jotos

In the simulator dialect/intuition are immigrant As you crossed the border you were slimmer and with debt you think in an accent and with death you think in an accent

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In the simulator empathy is ne’er a word but it’s hard not to feel something near its meaning as a border in your thoughts about the void you cross through and back again

de-simulating the border the same way you came Simulation categories: Border living in Juarez Border living in Nogales

Coyote in Chihuahua Forced coyote tachas

Quinceañera at BB’S hall

Chambelan at Los Portales wedding venue

Stuck in Nogales Sonora waiting to pass again Translating W-2 instructions for coworkers

Paying a mordida to keep your fence shop Operation Streamline

Operation Streamline 2 Humane borders ride along

Visiting the comedor Waiting to pass 1

Waiting to pass again Write 100 more

You were carrying on like usual in simulation Not out of fear but a longing for the border You wanted to return What was the border?

A return to what you knew a border of lock-the-workers-in or receding into a version of yourself along the border

In each simulation the people you meet their mouths are open they can’t close The rain that doesn’t fall for ages but then won’t stop in simulation

Debt and death in the border simulator

You can catch all the crossers you want in this one

The photos you find on the wall

Offer a map of how to cross You thought you forgot how many borders had been made You could keep track Use the cheat code where you flip the map so it looks like we’re on top This view allows for a purpose to cross

Many don’t want to leave the simulation Their time is up and there are others waiting

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When I look through the holes in the border wall there’s a pair staring back at me %

The voice that belongs to those eyes says “On this side everything is con weenie and there’s only play station dos”

but these corrugated words we leave behind on the bridge can’t keep for too long before they’re scooped up by customs

But what I really want to say about the border simulator is that I can’t It’s from a simulation we’re not used to anymore

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