Night. And silence.
Silence made bigger by the exceptions which prove its rule,
the cat snoring, and the refridgerator droning to the wall.
Night and silence.
And the telephone doesn’t ring at 3 Am,
it shrieks in the silence.
I fumble for it before I am awake.
And a calm voice, almost bored. Announces.
I am here to repossess your college education.
I am sorry. I knew I was behind on repaying my loans.
I am here to repossess your college education.
There must be some mistake. I will do better.
There are these burly little men.
Small enough to squeeze out of the holes in the listening part of the telephone.
They pop out and plod their way up my ear.
They wear tiny work boots.
and they have tiny picky axes.
They’d be cute
if they weren’t
busying themselves
at hacking away at my brains.
They fill up these burlap bags.
With memories of the best pot I ever smoked.
And apple fritters and air hockey at the student union.
And some classes, and a few things I learned.
They march out.
Ladened with bags that are full.
I have hung up the phone but they do not fret.
They walk underneath the closed front door.
They do not have to duck.
The little burly men
who came to repossess my college education.
Will turn it over to their bosses.
Who will sell my education off.
To pay back the loans I had fallen behind on.
It will make a dent.
In the sum that I owed.
A few months later.
I recieve a bill in the mail.
For the balance outstanding.
I can’t pay it off.
I’m not college educated anymore.
I’m making minimum wage.
Because I never bothered to learn any skills.
Either.