Apr 21

Apr 21 Commodore — NaPoWriMo Day #21 — a poem about obsolete habits and thoughts

Automaton. Plastic and circuits.
Product of my environment—
sad but significant sign of my times.
Taking fears and cranking out fearbots—
shaking, tears that rust my hopebits.

I ran life like a program
but I never replaced the motherboard.
I never upgraded the software.
While some surf on slender touchscreens,
I'm the lonely commodore in the corner.
Still grinding out worries,
still overprocessing lifethings.
Obsolete. No live stream.
Not much use for anything
that's naturally
built into me.

But I remember
drawing pixel by pixel
masterpieces that brought us joy.
On me—on me!—when I was a new toy.
Laughter and dreams of forever after,
enabled by the glow of an SD screen.

So maybe I'll shift to a different disc,
or maybe I'll recycle myself into all I skipped.
Maybe I'll end up junked before I get the chance.
It doesn't matter which.
It only matters that I existed—
that the code was as divine
as it could be for its time.
And it was.
Oh, God, it was.
Bylines and deadlines
were my goldmines
and my cloud nines.

It all makes sense
in retrospect,
and this relic
isn't done just yet.