picto chat

my first ds was shiny blue.
i sometimes talked to angels
using the picto chat feature.
i drew glyphs. sent them 
to their spiral hoards of eyes. really, i always
hoped the chats would land 
in the laps of other not-girls 
floating above their own moons.
instead, there was night the nightlight dark
& the angels who, despite their 
skill at witnessing, never wrote back. 
when summer came, i would wander
the town with my ds out. the angels
peered down at me. made umbrellas 
of their faces. i sometimes stood outside
a friend's house, in the hopes that maybe
they were on their ds too & we might exchange
outlines of each other's hands. 
she never was. the angels were often
selfish. they wanted me only to write 
to them. they begged for more effigies.
more thumbprints. more hours
of my glowing face. i gave it all to them.
my tiny language of eyelashes & caterpillars.
they swallowed every image. taped them
to the walls of a glass house filled with the sound
of running water. i have never been there.
once i saw someone else online during
my many tours around town. i did not know them.
i cannot remember if we actually shared
an image back & forth or if 
we just flashed across each other's screens.
either way, i felt like i had just caught
a dream by the lip. fish scales in the streetlamp. 
she gone so fast but then again so was i.