Psephologist

from Greek, psēphos  for pebble and vote
by Eveline Pye

I have hands the size of Scotland; 
my fingers reach through dense cloud
scoop up bundles of balloon-words
from a thousand interviews.

I mould answers into mountains,
calculate contours
as public opinion surges and slips,
moves like a wave through days.

I am a conduit for the crowd’s roar
in a  vast virtual amphitheatre;
voters, drowned in data, becalmed
in a fog of facts, listen as I speak.

Do I affect what I only seek to measure:
the observer-effect multiplied
on a million screens? I cast a pebble: 
a Marbled White unfurls its wings.