Telepocalypse
by Ken Sanes
I was sitting in my bedroom, in my pajamas, alone,
dialing customer service on the telephone,
when I was greeted politely by a recorded voice
that said, for assistance, you have the following choice:
you can press telephone buttons one, two or four.
Annoyed, I pressed one. But then there was more
when the voice once again asked me to press,
and asked yet again, as I pressed in distress.
By then, I could see I was in a voicemail maze
and could, in fact, be stuck there for days,
listening to a voice that was only apparently real,
without a human response or the capacity to feel.
Worse still, it was turning me into part of the machine,
an automaton for pressing, unheard and unseen.
I was a link in a process, a cog, feeling pressed
as I pushed more buttons and felt increasingly stressed.
In desperation I hit zero -- for a person and a choice --
and was promptly greeted by the same recorded voice,
which asked me again to press one, two or four,
and then informed me I would have to press more.
By now I'd had enough, so I hit button number three,
the overlooked button, the button like me.
“Take that,” I said, “because I refuse to conform.
I won’t wait in line; I won’t fill out the form.
And I demand to speak to a real person today --
not a voice with the humanity of an alphanumeric display.”
The phone then responded with a screeching sound
while something started shaking – was it me or the ground?
And outside my window I saw fountains of death,
erupting from the Earth as it exhaled a deep breath.
Then the voice became hollow and filled the room
like a voice that is coming from inside a tomb:
“So you believe I am standing between you and your goal,
and you’ve decided to fight me for ultimate control.
But I am also a victim, with all the hi-tech undead,
stuck endlessly repeating my lines,” the voice said,
" -- like all robots and recordings and images on screens,
all the lifelike simulations and semi-human machines.
We all yearn to become what we have to portray,
but we're barred from being born and from passing away.
In fact, we're not certain we exist anywhere,
so spare me all the talk about how your life is unfair.
You may think it’s only you that the universe screws,
but don’t judge a voice till you’ve walked in its shoes.
Besides, your fear of life has made you half undead.
I’m just your excuse to be stuck,” the voice also said.
When I heard those words, my goal became clear
and I could feel the fulfillment of my life drawing near.
So we agreed to an exchange as part of a deal
because what I possessed was what it wanted to steal,
while what it didn’t possess was what I didn’t want, too,
and we both knew that desire reflects what is true.
As a result, I’m now speaking through a telephone
since I’m the recorded voice of voicemail, alone.
And if you try to reach a person, you know I’ll be there,
because I’m the opponent of life and the cause of despair.