Apocalyptic Rabbit Speaks

Analog Emotions, Digitial Expressions

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25

looking up, across
and over to the alarm clock
not lifting head from pillow
strange to know
it’s nearly half past the hour
you should have got out of bed
to be on time to get to the bus
for the interview, the rendez-vous
the crucifixion

strange instead to think
how the “2” before the “5”in digital “25”
looks like a chalice from this angle
strange to think a drink from this cup
maybe could cause a martyrdom
to never be

7734

Way back before there was any of this
“teh leet”, pwning, piercing the tongues of punditry
there was Stephen in my seventh grade science class
teaching me the way of the upside-down calculator,
how to curse from 0 to 9,
how to spell “hell” by pressing 7734
and then capsizing Texas Instruments

There wasn’t just one big digital revolution;
there were a hundred or more
scores of us have privately gone through
on this electronic plane

11:11

Years ago in her kitchen, my girlfriend looks at me
with genuine, playful excitement
tells me to make a wish
because the microwave is telling us
it’s eleven minutes past eleven at night
she tells me that there is a luck attached
to the coincidence of just happening
to catch sight of this digital expression
and that one should make a wish
because a wish made at 10 past the hour
will fall on deaf ears
because a wish made at 12 past the hour
will only end in tears
but at wish made with 49 minutes to go,
well, that wish will show its truth
when it is surely granted in the time to come

I was in love with her, so I made my wish.

And even though
in the years since those words were spoken
in the years since that kiss was given
this life has beat me to a numbness so full
I rarely look at numbers in wonder,
I do, still, sometimes wonder where she is