incompatible mechanisms

irreparable damage

the belt shudders along.
it's almost to the center module.

a bell dings.
a buzzer sounds.
repeat.

shaking,
jumping,
bucking
slowly down the line.

i don't know how i will be judged.
my soul laid bare,
weighed against a feather by a god.

rolling,
trembling,
rumbling
further and further on.

bell dings.
small tremor.
buzzer shrieks again.
larger quake.

they discard the defects.
but the defects aren't broken.

we are people
not machines.
no one is perfect.

tossed aside,
dumped off the end of the belt,
what are they doing to my people?

we are a collection wholly different than what you've been taught to expect.
but ignorance isn't an excuse.

our systems are unlike yours.
(but you don't care.)

quiet chimes for success.
loud yells for rejection.
again, quicker.

help us.
it isn't hard.

chime.
buzzer.
ding.
screech.

faster and faster
my breath is slipping away.
closer it brings me with every noise.

they fall.
they rise.
a disposable army, ready
to bear the brunt of
being society's aliens.

a brilliant pace now.
milliseconds wasted on deciding.
why can't you help us?

we aren't made to work like this.
no one is,
not even your most perfect model.

we are flawed creations,
because you created us.

you
can
never
be
god.
stop pretending.

your reckless manner
kills,
maims,
abandons,
leaves nothing behind to remember.

my hardware is fragile and not unbroken.
my software is fried with your hypocritical rules.
my wires are crossed
my chips are busted
the plates guarding the wealth inside me is faulty
because you have faults.
because you are human.

but you are blind to it.

- r. b. auden