“internet chess”

internet chess

prodding hands pudge daringly across plastic keys,

jutting right from phonemes to my mouse.

i crack my knuckles methodically, place my gaze upon the digital façade,

and i prepare for onslaught.

i let my mind dance samba across the board,

and shift a rook daringly through electrodes,

i place it in a strategic eden, a vision of technical perfection …

and, somehow, i still end up in checkmate.

i lift my head from the 13-inch screen that has consumed my waking gaze for the past 15 minutes,

and i realize that i am 3 whole pages of notes behind. 

cue the recoup.

now, i seek to conquer my own puzzle,

recovering the monotonously-delivered information that has been forfeited in my mental absence,

and creating something salvageable from the scraps that i’ve retained.

for that is a chessboard that i can more easily solve.

i often wonder if i would be more efficient if i could devote my attention to entities while they are actually occurring,

rather than engaging myself in a continual game of catch up.

but where would the tact be in that?

and i seem to love to play games.