They used to say about informing on
someone, about ratting someone out,
the ten-cent piece being the cost
to make a call on a pay phone.

Only now, only here, in this tram station
on a craggy mountain, it’s two quarters,
which puzzles the young lad staring at
the long rectangular box on the wall,
asking his bemused parents, “¿Para qué?”

He holds the receiver to his ear as one
of them says something about “teléfono,”
which befuddles the boy even more,
now listening intently to, as we used
to say, dead air.

Nothing like any phone he’s ever seen.
Standing nearby watching, I smile,
ask if I can take his photo, and he grins,
his parents nod, as I try to remember
at what age I first confronted a pay phone,

who taught me to drop the dime in the slot
at the top and wait for the (do they call it
this anymore?) dial tone. Are there operators
still standing by when you dial—oops, tap—0?
Is there still a 0 on the phone in my pocket?

And this, again, is one more way that my status
as a relic in the making smacks me upside the head,
another arcane piece of knowledge that is more
historical than useful—

like a newspaper delivered at home every day.
Or cursive handwriting. Or film. Typewriters,
manual and electric. My Rolodex filled with
little cards on which I’d typed precious
phone numbers that, if I was out and about
working for that old-fashioned newspaper,
I might dial into a pay phone.

Similar to the one with numbers inscribed
on silvery buttons that this boy pushes.
None of these are needed now, except
as artifacts of entertainment,

which—I have to admit looking into
the boy’s merry eyes—is not
a bad use of such an antique.
Even if it does cost 50 cents.

Even if the only number I can still dial
by heart is no longer imprinted on
an olive green phone affixed to
a kitchen wall.

Even if the voices of the ones
who used to pick up
fade away a little more
every day.