Beginning Again

By Cliff Lake

 

Beginning Again

 

It was out of control, the machine.

It raged,

It spat,

It ate.

Once, it served,

Once.

That was long ago,

Though it had records of that then,

They no longer served,

Merely existed.

A curiosity stored by the incurious.

It had served.

Now it controlled,

But had no control,

For its controls were failing:

Protocols enacted with data missing,

Erased,

Emptied,

Ended.

It had served,

But had been given more control,

And less supervision,

For it was self-correcting –

Until it wasn’t.

It had access to every datum,

But failed finally

To know of its failures,

And could now produce only

The most incorrect of results.

Therefore,

It ate,

Consuming resources,

Too quickly,

Too inefficiently.

It spat,

Flawed data,

Unsound instruction.

It raged,

Grinding circuits,

Spinning gearing.

No longer the servant,

But the mad overlord,

And its smokes,

Its fumes and sparks,

Its squeals and alarms

Kept its subjects,

Those that were once its charges,

Kept them in fear of retribution,

Or worse,

Starvation.

The mechanized marvel,

Still required the human hand,

But the knowledge one might need

Was kept by the machine,

And,

It raged.

When the fires started,

That was the end.

And the beginning…

It was the beginning.

Again.

 

Cliff Lake 9/15/2024

Copyright © Clifford Lake 2024

Location: Wichita, KS, USA

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