Your voice is heavier than my memory's picture,
or else the zig-zags of the telephone wire
are humming too.
Its mechanical overtones match your voice
as you compile our ages and IQs
on the shallow grooves of your fingertips.

I am suspicious of the grander figures
fermenting in the hum of your heart.

The miles between us,
the distance between the countries of our parents,
I love grass and you are allergic to dirt:
the odds against us! you explain,
though the telephone's whirring is victorious,
shunning those unclear algorithms, your wry words
Insist though you may,

It is not the scheme of things
to think of the scheme of things.
The brain is a clever substitute
for a tingling heart.

Put the phone to your chest, prove me wrong.
Oh, nothing. Bzzz, bzz, says the telephone.
Well, let me talk to it instead.
“Do you love me?”

There is more silence than ever.
I hear your fingertips
whisk away in midair.
They grow tired, you sigh, silent and stumped.
The scrawling of your chalkboard, the flipping of pages,
there is much to keep you occupied.

But there is no equation. There is no answer,
for there was never any question.
Don't fret, young architect. Continue with your science,
I hope you find the third law of calculus.
Rest your fingers, if you like, I had no need to ask.