For the Love of the Game by Mandy Malloy

Neither loaded
dice nor
padded books
should have
purchase with
a, any
accountant contracted
for casual
audits

— yet
god knows
there have
been many—

teams of
stern men
in suits
solicited to
service the
tender economies:
applied, diligent
fellows, some
sincere in
their equations,
compounding the
bottom line,
factoring the
interest, charting
growth, its
advantages, benefits
instances of
prime rates
and vertiginously
high yields.

Vulnerable nodes
in the
bookkeeping offer
tempting collateral,
but no
algebra derives
cause or
effect when
the figures
dance a
Markovian chain
across the
misnumbered pages.

Identifying the
debt guarantees
no settlement.
The miscalculations
and false
allocations are
named, the
ticklish heel
applauded at
the guilty
party’s expense—

but still
the messenger
gets shot.