Improv, Week 9

When Collections Come

When Collections come
like the worst fear realized;
when collections come and steal dignity's crown

to pull me, and close the door on any chance of home ownership;
when collections come
like uninvited guests at the dinner table;

when collections come
like the aunt that always grabs your cheek,

I long for H.G. Wells truth and wonder
if choices made yesterday can slip past the digital age?

Therefore, I game the system
wait for hours to bleed the ones and zeros,
and become an undesirable leech
and I choose to follow Frost,

and each phone call now screams, as common as
as yesterday, but as whispers,

and each letter's neon threat, becomes
Jerry's next story about nothing.

When the FICA drops off the register, my life
will no longer be enslaved airline miles.
I was set free from percentages.

When it's over, status returns as sternness
becomes soft pillow fights.