Robotics


clickety-tippety-clickety-tippety-click
fingers flying 'cross the keyboard
ringed fingers snickety-plick together
long lacquered talons red tickety-tick on plastic
big bangles jangle on skeletal wrists
connecting
plump elbows
and jiggling round upper arms
to deft and dexterous palms
and light strong tapping long digits that know
more than they repeat
robotically

eight hours
clickety-tippety-clickety-tippety-click
eight hours
of robotics
until life

sixteen hours
soothing stroking holding healing cooking cleaning
sleeping in the dark

sixteen hours
feeding feeling telling teaching sipping serving
banishing fears of the small

sixteen hours
half unconscious
life
for sale at the price of
eight

eight hours
clickety-tippety-click
robotic repetition

one minute
fluttering remuneration
devouring deposit
into debt

sixteen hours
sixteen expensive hours
given away
purchased
by eight hours
sold cheap


one minute
smooth slips of paper
sliding one into another
numbers obscure
one minute
cold metal disks clicking
jingling lightly
trying to fly
away
like time

eight hours
clickety-tippety-clickety-tippety-click
red nails
buff keyboard
yellow dots of light
blue white fingers
working
always working
steadily wearing away the prints
that mark the self
rubbing themselves into stacks of paper
bearing other people's names
sighing other people's stories
like the machine that sings along
robotically

by Sara, copyright 1999, all rights reserved