Collect Call - Ash Bowen

Somewhere out there, an operator plugged in
            the wire of your voice to the switchboard

of Arkansas where I am
            happy to accept the charges—an act so antique

                         I think of Sputnik beeping
overhead, lovers petting in Buicks

            and glowing with the green of radium dials.
Bur what you've called to say is lost

            in the line's wreckage of crackle and static.
The night you went away

            the interstate glowed red beneath the flaring
                         fins of your father's Cadillac.

Now this collect call
            from outer space & what you've called to say
                         is clear at last: Among stars

lovers come and go easy as you please. It's the gravity
            of Earth that makes letting go so hard.

ASH BOWEN