The morning heaven's cybercafe opens, you're among the first
who line up outside, nostalgic for the days when you actually
paid with a coin from the heavy foreign handful in your pocket,
always more than seemed fair for ten minutes.
When you sign on, my instant message service creaks like a door's hinges
not oiled enough to admit a ghost. I don't remember
choosing the setting, and changing it would be far easier
than erasing the same sound from door or bone. But I don't.
We talk, through our fingers, of everyday things:
How hard you find it to dress for the weather
in heaven this week. How, at my office, birthday cakes now come
from a bakery you never tried but would have loved.
I press the video button in vain, wanting to know without asking
whether you carry tissues in the coins' old place in your pocket
in case of tears as we type. I keep the light off, the brightness up,
so I can be sure both our faces are glowing.