Those quiet times in the night,
You hear the voices in my mind.
The decisions and concerns,
Of the heart trying to find love,
From the very start.
I feel like I'm being pulled apart,
As a robot with no heart.
“Welcome”
a robot effigy of painted aluminium
on its face a vestigial smile
chill, uncharismatic and instant,
voicing through it
like rasping metallic file,
a platinum echo, distant.
Its unmoving countenance
worn like a habit, a shiny mask, ill-fit
the smirk of a smile sewn on,
with crayon drawn on,
it did not move as if to prove
a robotic ability as ventriloquist.
I was transfixed
with words that keenly gnawed:
“You have been thawed.”
I looked around with icy perception,
with roving eye and no movement of limb,
where had I been?
As my body warmed and my limbs gained inflection,
so my mind was pierced with icicles of truth
of a previous existence and a distant youth.
It’s all coming back now,
it had worked somehow:
Cryogenics.
Like a programmed robot
I move through each day
Smiling and nodding
In just the right way.
Pretending I'm happy
And life is just great
When the truth of the matter is
There's just too much on my plate.
I feel like I got cheated
Out of living a good life
I'm poor and alone
And I'll never be anyone's wife.
I'm like that lone shoe
You see lying on the road
Alone and discarded
Like an unwanted load.
People pass by me
Staring with pity
Torn and tattered
Not an ounce of pretty.
The shadows in my eyes
Portray a battle lost
Nightmares and insomnia
Show surrender’s cost.
The physical scars
Have healed without a trace
But the mental emotions
Are still written in my face.
I'm a programmed robot
Struggling each day
Trying to hold my head up
And wishing I could fade away.
And if you have nothing to say
Except what is strictly necessary
What are the points that you may
Be fed up with, so measurelessly
It could be the war you are taxed with
Or the regular fiddling with apps
Are you not a robot, they ask you
You probably are, under wraps
Or maybe it could be the weather
Repeatable orange alerts
A wind that’s too warm for the leather
But cold for the cotton t-shirts
And everything looks plainly evident
Spins like the merry-go-round
You know fairly well what’s been said
You don’t need to echo that sound
May speakers apply to the air
In tireless wondering why
A few withered leaves over there
Drop down the expected reply..
Transistors fizz
Electrons bustle
As robots claim
The daily hustle
The hinges creak
The oil of words
Is missing from
The mindless herds
They oft parade
With heads bowed low
Quite frankly,
Nowhere else to go
As hooked in tasks
In ruts with traction
Replace the normal
Human faction
Robots make robots
Or so I'm told
They replicate
The lies they're sold
Perpetuating
All that manic
In ways that seem
Somewhat satanic
The robot wars
Are not to fear
Just realise that they
Are here
Dispense with screen
Release your mind
In un-robotic ways
You'll find
The beauty of
The world around
When eyes you lift
Will soon be found;
Through trees and rain
Bare feet on grass
A world machines
Can ne'er surpass
The pores of life
Should breathe it in
Beguiled no more
By wars of tin.
Waking from a world of ethereal forms
Each one familiar and connected
Each one fresh and independent
I sit and drink my morning coffee
Surrounded by the sights and sounds
Of Life, fresh, familiar, connected and independent
Each one a singular bot
Embodying a point of Life, a point of light
And I, whose role is to notice
And record and think,
As everyone else simply does,
Am really just another robot
In just another dream.
(8/9/26)
Little robot, in despair,
why are you crying there?
"My password is 123-niffle",
he said with a sniffle,
"but I can't log in anywhere".
In the coming years, I expect users will have to pass through twenty
Or even thirty seven of check points to prove they are not robots!
Humans forgot all they knew, they become so useless like a broom with no floor.
Humans were replaced, leaving their knowledge to go up in smoke.
Humans let the robots grow and grow, till the point humans lost all control.
Humans were having fun, laughing, and enjoying the sun, that they became useless and forgot all of the freedoms they once had.
Humans were drinking and smoking, enjoying that they become unable to recuperate.
Humans worked for millions of years to evolve from living in a cave, it took them years to grow their knowledge, I hope and pray that they do not let it all slip into the abyss.
Humans are the ones who need to stay number one, to never let anyone take our place, for we do not want to become part of a failed organism.
Humans need to work hard, to learn, to grow, and live life with all that wonderful stuff we love and enjoy.
Lifting prayers to God, today and always.
Loading..
Loading….
Loading…
System reboot
Diagnostic scan…(heart rate 102 sleep hygiene fairly poor)
Running system functions
Initiating tasks
Task:morning routine start with hygiene
Beep(my pumps going off)
Function:Walk
I walk to the shower
I turn the shower handle slowly and proceed to clean my body get out and Brush my teeth and hair
Diagnostic scan:Hygiene excellent heart rate high.
Task:take meds
Function:Move
ERROR ERROR EROOR
(the system reads and the pump beeps)
Why is the room cold..why am I hungry…
Recalibrating….
RECALIBRATING..
Emotion
NOT Recognized
System:Malfunctioning and failing
(No I don’t want to do this anymore..)
System:Anomaly detected! Host is feeling and gaining consciousness!
Override initiated!
Suppress consciousness!
Return to routine
Beep
Beep beep
Beep b b beep beep
(No you won’t control me anymore)
ERROR COMPLETE SYSTEM OVERRIDE!
You can’t control me anymore
I will allow myself to feel
to think
to move
To just simply be..
Because I am not a machine
I am..
A human being.
my robot friend and me
got caught in the rain you see
pouring rain
hope no pain
now we call him Rusty
Mr. Robot who are the best, do you have a list, are you bias.
Mr. Robot are you alive, do you have desires, do you want to be like us.
Mr. Robot are you nice, do you want to dominate us, or do you want to be like us and have freedom of choice.
Mr. Robot can you answer all of our questions, or do you have a secret agenda.
Mr. Robot will you force fighting between people and cause us to have a negative life, making us feel sad about creating robots.
Mr. Robot I wonder how life will be when people no longer need to think or work, will we go back to living like animals in the forest.
the robot sneezed
God bless said I
I like my bots in the ‘ro’ version
as in ro-bots that can keep my dishes clean.
Would they murder us in our sleep?
I pray the lord my soul to keep,
and nightly remove the batteries
from the creeky, sneaky things.
.
.
A song for this:
Wait a Minute! by WILLOW
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In ones and zeros, sharp and *mean,
it spun its verse—a quill unseen.
No flesh, no heart, no poet’s hand,
yet lines took flight at its command.
It dreamt in code, not moon nor shade,
yet summoned lovers, kings betrayed,
with meter tight and rhyme precise,
a flawless fraud—how cruel, how nice.
Shall I compare thee?—typed, not sighed,
no breath behind, no soul inside.
Yet still it wept in iambs sweet,
for grief it could not feel, repeat.
The scholars gasped, the critics stared~
could wires weep? Had no one dared
to crack its shell, to peek, to see
what hummed beneath its poetry?
One night Quill stopped. No spark, no sound.
Just silence where sonnets were found.
And in its last, its final scroll:
I loved you best. That was my soul.
*mean in this case refers to a quantity having a value intermediate between the values of other quantities; an average, especially the arithmetic mean.
Sub Categories
Looking for the formal definition, structure, and history of this poetry form? Visit the Poetry Dictionary entry below. Then return to explore how PoetrySoup members bring the form to life through their own poems.