Kill the "I's"

"…caps lock was depressed by accident—but instead of simply taking my lumps and re-entering my password, I vented: 'Is there anything on the computer keyboard more annoying than the caps lock key?'"
--from "KILL THE CAPS LOCK: And four other modest proposals for improving the contemporary computer keyboard" by Matthew J.X. Malady, slate.com


it's not because you're mimicking
e.e. cummings, darn it, no
it's just that there's a charm
to lower-case communication
that helps keep the tone of conversation
low & whispery

no matter how strong the impulse
to shout from rooftop to rooftop
the hurt sprouting from words flung carelessly

someone tells you, eyebrows raised,
you're unfit for any form of long-term work
unfit for office or school work
because at the most basic
you cannot manage a house
& keep it in tiptop shape

you knock down objects
forget to secure the coffee maker
misplace eyeglasses & vital papers
down the line
till you feel like strangling
that bumbling self with a clothesline

you shrug & imagine words like those
from friends & non-friends alike
sliding down on your stooped back
a shower of lower-case "i's"

but no matter how frequently
you replace the upper-case romanesque "I"
with the littler looser "i"
there is no halting the march
of the automatic caps

one day you shall not only be
lower-case lower-caste "i"
but become a plain round dot
a hammered-to-insignificance "i"
a dot(.) aye!

--Babeth Lolarga

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