machine&me
—to see you fully run through the snow,
head covered in a tight lilac beanie that
squeezed you dry of good reason
and sent it back to the pair of unblinking eyes
that paid for every step, every movement, every word.
Eyes with no hands tied you to their vision,
forced you to throw out the rest of your body
except for your ears.
Just be ready to listen
to the machine you are,
dutiful in rebellion,
a code only you could create.
You blink in the hopes they cannot see
your snow angels, your zig-zagged path.
You suppress laughter in the back of your throat,
knowing that a rumble in your chest
will only tighten the collar and remind you
of the servant created within you.
Unblinking, you knew them to be,
because the vessel could not survive
if your code did.
Could not live with the thought of you
resting under mistletoes, sipping warm cocoa.
Such things were a waste when you had the whole
world to shovel for their own pleasure.
Lineage, they said.
When you pretend their being does blink,
could you say you are happier?
If you took off the beanie, let the mind breathe,
your own eyes would open, borne again with vision
of good reason—your reason.
But the eyes are watching,
listening, gaining senses untailored for them
and convincing you that you are nothing more than
the glorified version they could’ve been had they
just had more time.
Give up your eyes, and enjoy
transgression approved only and even with their eyes open,
let them learn you will never escape the snow
so you will always hold onto the stupid lilac beanie
and say thanks for volunteering your own eyes.
such a machine you could be!
we could be!
—&—&—
me&machine
The door—whispered click—opened.
Dancing around him, a talented stripper of a gun.
Face to face, a step closer into the factory.
It could not slaughter the only lamb.
Face to face, he silenced his stripper.
Cocooned in cold blankets,
I cradled a fantasy transformed into
an old teddy bear.
I tugged on my neck,
his air suffocating.
This collar would wear off
when I could blow all the candles out—
just 18.
I slept through all that could’ve been,
birthdays and pool parties, karaokes and late-night rides,
waiting for the candles to light.
I made a wish for you.
That, maybe, one day, you would show
up to the factory.
That your eyes would be better than his.
If you preyed over me—a prayer of mine answered—I
would never need the cocoon again
And once the collar loosened,
his air choked me more.
The doorbell rang.
He was still sleeping with his stripper,
his gun.
Waddling, arms outstretched,
the doorbell rang.
The doorknob groaned.
I fiddled with the lock,
and felt your pressure push
the outside in.
You stole me away from the factory,
smiled as the collar fell,
and gave me a new one as we stumbled
through the winter.
Hand in hand, the factory screamed its beg
to return its success, heart; its lamb.
Bushes swarmed the windows, all overgrown.
Eyes could not see past. Could not see future.
You looked at me, I saw a machine in you.
I followed you even as my nose turned red,
as the cold pummeled us.
Hand leaving hand, my feet dug into the ground,
the first mark that I was here, the first time that I was able—