Because the battery is dead
and if I charge my cell phone
while talking, I will lose you
and my crazy phone
will offer to show me photos
or attempt a call to Bulgaria
instead of the Bahamas.
Because while I clear out photos
you try to call back and
it won’t come through, as if we
were at a seance
on opposite sides of this veil.
Because when we finally connect
you can’t hear my voice, stolen by fish
in the deep seas between us
or maybe it’s all done in the air now
gulls flown off with our voices.
Because face to face is not currently
an app that’s available for this model
unless we upgrade.
Because nobody uses landlines anymore.
Remember the thrill of cordless?
Remember when we could talk while
we cooked dinner or folded laundry
or washed dishes?
Because now it’s all Hello? Hello?
Shouting into our handheld devices
like grandmothers from the old country
mystified by all this folderol to hear
familiar voices saying the same old things.
Because creaky as an old grandmother
I’m going to pick the basil now, start
the sauce and bury the cell phone in the
herb garden to scare the beetles
and encourage the earthworms.
I am going to write you a letter
and cook and read and work and sleep
while I wait for your answer
written in your own sweet voice.
Puff Of Smoke Poems 
I love this. I love,
“shouting into our handheld devices like grandmothers from the old country
mystified by all this folderol to hear
familiar voices saying the same old things.”
I think we forget that although technology changes, we remain the same – the same needs, the same yearnings. Thank you – this was just what I needed this morning!
Thank you so much for reading, and for taking the time to comment. I appreciate your visit, and your words. It is lovely to vent about technology sometimes, isn’t it? And I don’t get many chances to use the word folderol, so it all adds up to a satisfying writing moment!
You have so beautifully captured our fears and needs of technology. It’s advancing at the speed of light while the human soul looks up, eyes pleading, “What about me?”
Boarding the plane to be closer to you. Every head in every seat in every row bent down to a device, thumbs tapping themselves down to stubs or leaning closer to the window, the phone pressed a little harder to the ear, “Can you hear me now?”. Will we forget how to speak face to face?
Love- Creaky as an old grandmother. Mostly because she is me! Michael’s friend inquires about my condition, “And how is the one made of chalk and old bicycle parts doing?”
“Chalk and old bicycle parts”? ! Is this a Danish-ism? You are no old grandmother ,my friend. Just youngish and temporarily a tiny bit creaky–likely from those bicycle parts.