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Technopoems

           
One of the seductive things about the internet is its immediacy.
It kind of demands immediate involvement but our lives have
priorites and often we must set the internet aside and do what
is important and let the immediacy go. So time between
communication is just time spent on those real events that
fill out our lives. John Peterson, Publisher, PoeticMatrix.com


SEMICONDUCTORS --   WHERE  IS THE CONDUCTOR?
Part 1.

                                                       

1.
Semiconductors
     conduct and insulate,
Insinuate the new,
     incinerate the old,
Speed on speed.
Batons beat faster
     than they ever dared,
Beat slow steppers
     into submission.
Victory measured in megahertz,
     is the coin of this realm.

Computers , who are fruitful
     but do not multiply,
Speed us beyond thought.
Neither do they fret,
     nor weary us with unwanted chatter.
With this new ignition key
We speed forth,
     like Hermes on the highway,
Glibly solving mysteries
     and rewriting social history.
With our  social graces in glasses,
     we glibly toast the new.
Like laser band firebrands
     we create speed
And regale the world with sparks.
With our new principle,
     we feel invincible.
Not on our shoulder,
Our chips connect to the sockets of time,
    their prongs poke the spokes
Of the wheel of rebirth --
We can shut this mother down.

                                                          
2.
Once a labyrinth within  a penitentiary,
Organic matter is now freed
    of  process
To become stainless and steely.
Touched  by humans who touch
    silicon for speed
Mother earth  is made
    organic free.

Calculations proceed
     at breakneck speed,
As the order of things
     get understood and unwound,
Like Prometheus unbound.
Things will not sink us,
     inchoate,
With our dreams intact,
For we can rise,
     despite our broken backs,
Reclaim our birthrights
     from nature's hooves and claws,
From misbehaving storms,
     or misbegotten genes,
Will Plato’s Sun crash through
     the walls of the cave
And smash our premises and fantasies,
     like protruding ancient follicles?

Like children of fire,
     we flare everywhere,
Flail and feel
    that we cannot fail,
Invincible,
     with our newest principles.

With no speed bumps
     to slow us,
Speed presses us down,
    to the pedal we are bound.
Is there a fatal flaw in our speed?
Humans speak,
    and systems crash,
Like flares from Plato’s cave.

                                                      
3.
No resting electrons
     to rust away,
Just old specs,
Communications broad band,
Banded with our excesses
     and idiosyncrasies,
Brand us,
Pro Pell our chatter
     past airwaves
Onto starways.

Our words send
     cheap thrills
Past expensive space ships,
    that proceed  us (seeding us),
And fall
    like space dust
On our journeys
    to and from the light.

Will our words
     wound us,
Or wing us to where
Cosmic super strings
     touch us,
And nudge us on,
     conscious of our origins.
Will our listeners say
That this species had a genius
     to  make things unright?

A slice of big bang,
We should remember
    that we are spliced with the dust of stars
That can carry us (carrion us)
Past our mission here,
    our missionary position
Of head strong thrusting
     into the wrong places.
Our technology outstrips us,
     strips us down,
Then, outsources  our morality
    to the highest bidder.

                              

4.                

Our faculties have a flare
     for prolonging our lives,
And increasing our power.
People await new milestones
     like miracles,
To free the manacles
     from the longings of their choice.
Will  we enter cryogenic boxes
To be let out
     and lit up,
As  lighted beings
    once more,

Or will we be propelled somewhere new,
     as someone else,
Mechanically resuscitated,
    invigorated
reincarnated in new flesh and steel,
    genetically perfected,

Desire bodies reinjected,
Ready to seek  new debaucheries
     or subtleties,
To give our longings
     new faces?

                                

5.

As things speed up,
Will there be more accidents,
     class dislocations,
Continental shifts,
Viruses in wormholes,
Or other stalkers in celestial
    corridors,
Looking for a  break?

Will we improve the world
     or wound it with our tractors,
We who've put the world in traction,

The wheel of rebirth
     will not tarry,
No carry us less helpless than before.
Though pushed for speed,
     by its budding principle,
Brightest student,
Who feels no temerity
     at higher mysteries,
We  can  be beaten down
     by nature’s hooves and claws,
By misbehaving storms
     or misbegotten genes.

Can we readjust our strategies
     to the higher stratospheres
From  which we came,
Mixing star dust
     with seeds that lie fallow

To produce higher wisdom?

                               

Part 2           

     To be continued??
 


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Copyright 2000 Paul L. Dolinsky
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pdolan@fairpoint.net