The wheel turns,
quiet as habit.
The costumes change,
new colors, new slogans,
old hands inside the sleeves.
We call it progress
because the mirrors are better lit now,
because the language learned to smile.
But the bones remember.
They creak in the same places.
The names change.
The uniforms soften.
The rules get rewritten
in ink that washes off by morning.
Someone always says,
This time is different.
Someone always pays
for believing them.
The wheel keeps turning.
It does not care
what we call it.