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Saturday, September 3, 2016

Send Error Report





My computer is so polite,
its binary kindness
pressed into a little square
asking me to SEND ERROR REPORT?

I imagine some poor intern at a desk
rubbing sleep from his eyes,
wiping coffee stains from his plain white dress shirt.

No SAT tutor,
spelling errors on his admissions essay,
“Call of Duty” instead of Organic Chemistry.

He slouches behind the unfortunate desk –
a sad mockery of the desks he ignored in college,
next to the tired single mother happy to work
in the quiet predictability of an office.

Children dream of being astronauts,
famous baseball players, doctors, and princesses.
Cheering crowds and large mansions furnish
our youthful imaginations,
adventures in far-away lands,
a world of endless surprise,
leaving the boring jobs
to kids who don’t have the luxury of their own dreams.

No little boy tells his teacher –
when I grow up I want to be the ‘SEND ERROR REPORT’ guy,
a job that has never been discussed
in the glitter-and-glue world of first grade.

I was always told that I would have to pay for my mistakes.
I will never understand the “Error” I made
but I am glad that it is now someone else’s problem,
someone reading my screen in anger
in an office I will never see.