My GP’s “office” is now
an on-line app
that allows me to log on
and exchange emails–
after I find the password
I can’t remember, haven’t used
since the last consultation
six months ago, when the pandemic
was just warming up.

“Please email me
if you have any questions,”
reads the text, after several lines
of medical terms and numbers
that supposedly indicate
the state of my androids or barnacles
or whatever they discovered
in the blood test last week.
All lost on me, like the password.

One question would be
why a five-minute phone conversation
(since my last live appointment
was canceled due to COVID)
was worth $223.
But I’ll let that go
as the insurance covered it.
On the third submission.

On-line has its good points,
but so far there’s no app

that can stick a finger up my ass,
so my urology appointment
hasn’t been canceled. 



C. T. Holte grew up playing under bridges and in cornfields; went to lots of school; had gigs as teacher, peddler, editor, etc.; recently migrated to New Mexico with his beautiful partner; and got a great chainsaw for Christmas.  He’s been published in Words, Touch,The Daily Drunk, California Quarterly, Mediterranean Poetry,Pensive, and elsewhere.  [50 words on the nose]