Our Older Friends, Forever In Meat Space

The trauma of technology for the elderly

Jackie Olsen
Rainbow Salad

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Photo by Jakob Owens on Unsplash

why has the world changed
the rules are wholly different
impenetrable by any measure

surely a sign of the world’s decline
a vast conspiracy toward the individual

I sat amicably with my neighbor
who asked, why does no one teach me
about my phone?

she then worked herself into a lather
about impatient young people
who snatch her phone from her
instead of showing her how to access
step by step gobbledygook
in a manner that makes sense

I recalled this very anger, this impotence
from my nursing home years

there was a paradigm shift that occurred in my lifetime
in the 90s and aughts

suddenly everything was “windowed”
in advertisements, in the new internet
a new way to parcel up the world
to present information

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Jackie Olsen
Rainbow Salad

Come for the insights on aging, leave with a doggie bag full of frogs and exoplanets. Now more poems about vacuuming! she/her/hers