Wi-Fi Wake

wake to my phone,
not buzzing,
but meditating,
email spinning its little zen wheel.

downstairs,
in pyjamas,
clutching a dumb Oura ring,
I find my daughters
staring into blank glass.

“Daddy,” says the eldest,
“Instagram’s dead.
how will I post my smoothie art?”

I suggest toast,
maybe conversation.
they blink,
like I proposed exile
to a cave without sockets.

by nine,
the whole street has surrendered.
no "can you hear me?" calls,
just neighbours
waving phones at clouds,
conducting a techno seance.

over the hedge,
Mrs Johnson,
barefoot in the dew,
screams at her router:
"Get me Elon Musk!"

at work,
the CIO pounds the conference door.
email is dead.
servers hum in mockery.

"It’s global,"
I say,
guessing wildly.
the first fallacy of apocalypse:
hasty generalisation.

lunch:
the newsreader asks
how we will survive.
suggests books,
letters,
pigeons.

dinner:
toasted cheese,
guilt.

tears:
a half-drawn owl
lost in the wires.

“paper,”
I whisper,
"there’s always paper."

night:
kids with footballs,
neighbours trading gossip
like rare coins.

tucking them in,
I see:
the strongest networks
have no passwords.

lying awake,
the ceiling breathing above me,
I wonder—

will the signal
ever return?

or have we,
at last,
come home?

FSF