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Someone is dialing wrong numbers
on my windshield.
The broken glass is an illegible scrawl
across my driver’s seat.
I can only make out
a few angry obscenities.
I never use language like that.
I wonder whose phone number
is printed on my license plate.
Someone is dialing wrong numbers
on my windshield.
The message on my answering machine
is asking for spare change.
“Just twenty cents, please,
so I can make another call.”
Someone is dialing wrong numbers
on my windshield.
When I answer the phone,
a voice asks about
the earthquake last night.
“Did you feel it too?”
But it was just helicopters,
low over the house.
Their searchlights
checking my driveway
for drug dealers, prostitutes
and kids with skateboards.
Or else one of those monster jobs
out of Pendleton, hauling Marines
off to exercises somewhere.
I hope it’s just practice this time.
Someone is dialing wrong numbers
on my windshield.
And faxing me bills
for toys I never bought.
I don’t even own a TV.
What would I want with
the Time-Life video cassette library
of history’s greatest massacres?
Complete with annual updates
Someone is dialing wrong numbers
on my windshield
Andspray painting graffiti
on my tailgate
and telling me it’s art.
There’s even a price tag on it.
I can tell it’s the real thing,
because the price is so damn high.
Someone is dialing wrong numbers
on my windshield.
The ringing in my ears
is an alarm clock ticking.
Wrong Numbers
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