Sometimes when I check my e-mail, I
see a note from WordPress. Cautious-
ly, I get excited that someone has
gone to the blog, read a poem and has
a comment. I say cautiously because
sometimes spam sneaks through, like
today. I got one in broken English
telling me my work is of such astound-
ing insight that the writer just could-
n’t help but comment and wondered if
I might be interested in little pink
pills. I click “Mark as Spam,” which
then leads me to signing in in order
to go to the spam folder where I us-
ually see a few notes up to numbers
in the teens but sometimes up to, oh
say, as many as sixty-five spam notes.
I give thanks that WordPress catches
the vast majority. Then I see that
69,000 spam notes have been detected
since September 2011. Would I have
gotten tired reading all 69,000 notes
if they had been compliments about
my poetry? Just kidding. I hit “De-
lete Spam.” I log out, go to Word
document, write another poem, sign
in to post the poem and notice but
another note in the spam folder.
Then I think, hey, somebody in Sri-
Lanka knows I’m alive.