by Roberta Gould

I threw the fax
into a cardboard box of recyclables
Never used
its chrome shined clean, perfect
But it was too slow
the latest software speeding
up the world
ready for a heart attack

You laugh
That’s how we go on
observing the absurdity of infinite greed
as you toss the rest of the garbage
into the bin at your 2nd job where you talk to me
wearing rubber gloves with beige leather
proud, elegant

They don’t use this machine anywhere, I say
Technology made it obsolete
before I even used it
The snake eats its tail
on and on

as when I waited
under the thatched roof of a fruit store
three years back – inventory entered on a computer
so I couldn’t simply hand the man
a coin for the mango and leave
I had to wait as he looked for the right
key to press so that somewhere in the sky of infinite numbers
it would be recorded
for no one to see