Servile at first glance
as close as a favourite pet.
Upright, always exactly level
it greets us with blanched whiteness–
the modern kitchen’s sunny fixture.
A simple press of a button
and it shivers and stirs
–a murmur lifting to a roar–
repeating itself with every gesture
but longing to be asked a different question
to have another answer.
In the lamplight, magnified against the wall
it projects itself onto a silver screen
striding high overhead, animate and elsewhere.
Containing the medium for life
it wonders about its maker when not in use
but is sterile inside.
Time is a slow drip within.
Conversation slips on smooth walls
until, after perhaps a thousand attempts
freedom comes at the end of a short lead
filling the night with its escape the brittle, burnt out wires
a knot of fused colour.
