There Is Nothing Left to Say

What would Thoreau ever think
About our need to stay in synch?
A shack, a pond, a tree, a stone.
In the 19th century, there was no phone.
Like Garbo, he wanted to be alone.

Cell phones, Blackberries, Facebook, Twitter
Have caused excessive verbal litter.
Cell phone towers have been erected
To aid our urge to stay connected.
Not one soul can be neglected.

How connected can we be?
She left the house at 10 to three.
At 3:05 she made a call
To say that she had reached the mall.
(Do we really care at all?)

At 3:25, she decided to tweet
To say she’d found a place to meet.
She’d found a booth at a grill
And planned to hold the booth until
All her friends could eat their fill.

Five text messages right away
Told her they were on their way.
Got there quicker than expected,
Sat down together and then texted
Other friends from far away.

At the end of the day,
There was nothing left to say.

Texting for some is an addiction
That causes constant finger twitchin’
“How R U? I M OK.”
“LOL & DOA.”
Every letter comes in to play,
But there is nothing left to say.

In churches, shops, museums, and schools,
Phones are ringing despite the rules.
Never focused, never there
In the moment. We don’t care.
Personal meetings are quite rare.

Because at the end of the day,
There is nothing left to say.

When I feel the need to speak,
I call my children once a week.
More often than that, what would I say?
Hello, my dear, how was your day?
(About the same as yesterday?)

This poem will be published in a blog.
I’d rather carve it on a log.
But then it would be read by a frog or two,
And for me that wouldn’t do.
I want my friends to read it too.
8/2009