Viable

It’s the connotation that matters:
Something feasible
turns preferable,
enhanced commodity
made critical,
spun up in significance,
passing as more important
than it is.
You see it in online ads,
these viable options,
leather seats that heat,
easy-clean granite countertops,
or waterfront property that percs,  
streaming us a longing,
spies invited in.
 
Maybe that’s what the word really means –
espionage,
big data traipsing about,
tracking our cookies and cache,
picking up the crumbs
of our everyday,
following us home.
I hate to sound like a conspiracy theorist,
but we all know it’s true.
It’s gone beyond the possible,
climbed the six-foot fence
of privacy and hopped right over.
No number of German shepherds
can keep it
from running quickly,
tree to tree,
hiding from the sensor
of the backyard light,
treading like a good mystery,
leaving no footprints.
It sneaks into the window
left accidentally unlocked.
 
There we are, asleep,
mouths open, drooling.
And there’s our wallet
on the nightstand,
a few stray coins on the floor.
That’s us, dreaming.
Just wait ‘til we wake up.