Cell

It is the length of the average wallet,
about four-and-a-half inches.
A dollar bill placed on top
easily obscures this polyhedron’s width.
Five of its faces are not much to look at
but one of these will glow at times,
with a radiance greater than a cigarette lighter
in a dark room.
That’s when we find ourselves
returning to it, touching it, talking to it—
beckoned by its brilliance and buzz.
Attuned to its sounds like parents
to their children’s cries, and responding
to its calls more than this. We attend
to this four-and-a-half inch machine
again. Yet, its true length lies
in the distance between this phone
and that phone, and the distance
these phones continue to create
between people.

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