A call not about
Sweepstakes I never entered
Just a wrong number
In this minimalist yet emotionally layered haiku, the speaker recounts a seemingly mundane event: receiving a phone call that turns out to be a wrong number. However, the poem uses this incident as a metaphor for the larger emotional experience of entering new relationships—particularly the hopeful, uncertain space where romantic potential lives and often dissolves.
The poem opens with “A call not about,” a line intentionally left incomplete, evoking a sense of open possibility. It invites the reader into a moment of suspended expectation, paralleling the anticipation often felt when meeting someone new. This expectation is expanded in the second line, “Sweepstakes I never entered,” which cleverly captures the irrational hope for sudden emotional reward—desire without groundwork, love without history. The speaker knows the odds, yet still yearns.
The final line, “Just a wrong number,” delivers an understated but poignant turn. What initially felt like fate or connection is revealed as coincidence—an impersonal glitch mistaken for meaning. In doing so, the poem critiques the human tendency to romanticize beginnings, projecting possibility onto strangers, only to face the quiet disillusionment that follows.
Through everyday imagery and restrained language, the poet reflects on the fragility of expectations in modern connection. The piece resists melodrama, instead presenting romantic disappointment with irony and emotional clarity, suggesting that in love—as in life—what feels destined is often accidental.
