I heard a plaintiff poet read
A poem she'd written
Where she repeated the title frequently,
"I'm not a machine."

"I'm not a machine," she'd say,
And look out at the audience
With a far-a-way look on her face.
Her shoulders would drop
Every time she said it,
As if she almost could herself believe it,
If she could but utter it one more time in Latin.

But her poem didn't rhyme,
And there wasn't any magic fairy dust
To sprinkle on her rusted gears,
Or a velveteen way to give her any skin,
Or a wizard behind a thin curtain
To give her any soul.

But good for her, I thought,
With all her words and all her themes.
She's not a machine,
But I am.
I can wake every day and not give a damn
About doing good or doing harm.

But give me farms to cultivate!
Cotton to bale! Peanuts to combine!
My mechanical arm never tires,
It only needs more grease,
Hydraulic fluid and baling wire,
A fine crease down the center of my metal pants
To winnow away the chaff.

I can laugh now,
But I was once like her--
A machine,
But not sure
What thing it was I was meant to do.

Someday she will be like me.
She'll wake, or sleep,
I don't remember which I did
To turn the switch,
To on,
Or, it dawns on me as I sit idle,
Waiting for the farmer's bridle
To come and up the throttle.
Then I will sputter and cough
And wonder if I may have turned me off, instead?

-jenn