Random Acts of Poetry

Random Acts of Poetry

Crank Calls

I never see them
but they keep calling:

My dead grandmother,
the old girlfriend,

lost roommates and
hometown kids.

How they have my number now
I can't quite fathom.

The phone rings and rings,
a nagging toothache,

and I know it's them again,
wanting to reminisce

about the way the grass smelled
sharp after a Saturday mowing,

about pot haze and sitars,
the night in the cabin

with the creaky bed
and the thin walls

and the time I fell
out of the tree.

Falling, falling.
Why are they calling me?

Now when none of it matters,
when I'm half dead already?

Operator, I'd like to report
a series of harassing phone calls.

Somebody whispering on the line,
people mumbling

about cracked mirrors,
spent tickets and lists of wishes.

I think your wires are crossed,
or my phone is bugged, operator.

Operator?