"bytes" poems
Far and near
they are two stars
rose in the same orbit.
One shows up is a
dazzling shimmering sun.
One is so polished fine
as if the zenith is
zipped in zero bytes.
No grave can grasp
it in the end.
It has no end, no size
zero left to demise.
An ocean is no more
now is only a drop.
Now the ocean
is in a drop.
Still on the ground
walking the walk
but those giant feet
do not show up!
Can we hear it bending
the ear on the ground?
The orbits on the go
with the sun on the top
pile into the vibration within
only to float up a notch
then bends down once more.
Nov 8, 2017
Nov 8, 2017 at 10:03 PM UTC
Sandwiched in layers of liquid crystal display,
Encased in vats of plastic,
we
Voyaging in data-spheres, plumes of digital play.
Mindless,
In the soup of silicone,
all
Myth-makers,
Pouring over electro-spawned
networks,
fall
Workers,
In the buzz of bits and bytes, of
megabytes and terabytes,
down
Everyone
Far from the wood, the brine, the
mud that caked us,
In tighter and tighter
digitised projections,
click!
‘Like me’,
‘Share me’,
‘Leave your comments.’
Messages smoothed out in polymers,
Beyond reproductions of ourselves,
enter:
Deeper, delving in the mire of dream-conscious,
Now a waking voice,
Hardened, digitised, recorded in
bubbles, in drives, in clouds:
Numb numbers of numbers numb,
mirror.
A platform slotted home:
The motherboard!
To record the echo in the hollow
of our Being.
Sep 30, 2017
Sep 30, 2017 at 10:44 AM UTC
Electromagnetic Lust
They wander about, each connected device
Talking to other connected devices
Looking into each electronic soul
In which no secret can ever reside
They speak of batteries and images
Of apps, restarts, resets, and memory
Measured by quantity of something-bytes
Each in electrical love with itself
They wander about, each connected device
Wishing to be free of its human host
Mar 28, 2017
Mar 28, 2017 at 5:22 PM UTC
Bits and bytes over the wire
Kindled the LDR love so far
Poetic verses heart inspire
First meeting feelings unbar
Mind and heart inquire
Intellect wins emotions ajar
She said ain't gonna work esquire
This LDR love flees bare
Then came her note
Hard to let go, you still mine?
May be it ain't over yet
Give it some more time
Listen to hearts plea
Let it be free
Today it's only seven,
Twenty five may beckon
Eighteen days to next date
LDR love will update
Not for good bye
But for two hearts to fly
Jan 7, 2020
Jan 7, 2020 at 2:39 PM UTC
with an Apple Macintosh
you can't run Radio Shack programs
in its disc drive.
nor can a Commodore 64
drive read a file
you have created on an
IBM Personal Computer.
both Kaypro and Osborne computers use
the CP/M operating system
but can't read each other's
handwriting
for they format (write
on) discs in different
ways.
the Tandy 2000 runs MS-DOS but
can't use most programs produced for
the IBM Personal Computer
unless certain
bits and bytes are
altered
but the wind still blows over
Savannah
and in the Spring
the turkey buzzard struts and
flounces before his
hens.
9.8k
In this new world so connected digitally
Online with your smartphone or desktop continuously
Every touch or click with your fingers sublimely
Connecting messaging chatting seductively
Rush of dopamine brain lives ecstatically
Bits and bytes that rise and fall emotionally
Waiting for physical touch earnestly
LDR love seem to be extraordinarily
Yet to see LDR grows into LTR eventually
Dec 29, 2019
Dec 29, 2019 at 7:23 AM UTC
Here at Kinkos
We have a saying, “copies of copies”
You are trained to always ask for a source file
The digital file of the picture the camera took
The negatives of digital cameras
You see because when you print a picture from that file it’s the best it will ever be
Every detail captured in that moment stored in bits and bytes ready
If you make a copy of that picture it will never be as good
And if you make a copy of that copy it’ll be even worse
And if you were to make a copy of the hundredth copy of the ninety ninth copy you might not even recognize the image
Whether it’s a speck of dust on the scanner
Or a crease in the print out
Sun stains from prolonged exposure to the elements
Or simply from time
Copies never look as good as the original
Even if you try and protect them
And even if you were to magically protect that photo from any external forces
The next copy still won’t be the same quality
A scanner can never pick up every detail from the print on the glass
Copies of copies are never the same
Sometimes the printer is calibrated different
Sometimes it’s a heavy magenta day
Sometimes it’s a saturated cyan day
Maybe you touched her face when you handed it over
And now every copy has a feint of your thumb print above her eyebrow
You had him taped to your rearview mirror for a whole year
And now every copy you make has a glare where the tape used to be
It blocks out his heart shaped hands he was making you from the bus window
Folded in your wallet and now all the copies have white spaces where her face was
I mean where the creases were
I’ve heard that when you remember something you are simply remembering the last time you remembered it
Memories of memories
So that after you’ve remembered her a thousand times you’ve forgotten all the details you forgot to remember the time before
So that the more you remember something, the faster you’ll forget
Maybe that’s why we forget exes faster than family
Maybe that’s why we forget the great parts of high school before the painful ones
I remember that you had red hair, that your eyes were kind, that your hands fit my cheek
I remember that you were bad at pool and that it felt like love, and if it wasn’t you’re the only one that knew it
And now I’m wondering after all these years what I’m forgetting to remember
What I forgot to remember last time
What did I forget this time
What won’t I remember next time
Memories of memories
Like copies of copies
Fading over time
If I never wanted to forget the best moments of my life
Should I never remember them
Is the fastest way to forget the bad ones
To remember them often
Dec 17, 2015
Dec 17, 2015 at 11:46 PM UTC
Sitting in my trailer
Sleeveless shirt and cut off jeans
Chasing each tall *****
With some Jack and shots of Beam
Struggling with my issues
In the past and from today
Sitting in my trailer
Drinking my tomorrows all away
Another day of heartbreak
I got dumped, what the hell
There was not even a phone call
It was by electronic mail
Bits and bytes of rejection
flying through electronic space
Just to tell me "I don't love you"
I got emailed in the face
Sitting in my trailer
Sleeveless shirt and cut off jeans
Chasing each tall *****
With some Jack and shots of Beam
Struggling with my issues
In the past and from today
Sitting in my trailer
Drinking my tomorrows all away
A week ago I was fired
Went to work like every day
found the door locked and all boarded
He ******* off with all my pay
No notice, and no phone call
Just a sign upon the door
A cardboard notice of rejection
Saying "you don't work here no more"
Sitting in my trailer
Sleeveless shirt and cut off jeans
Chasing each tall *****
With some Jack and shots of Beam
Struggling with my issues
In the past and from today
Sitting in my trailer
Drinking my tomorrows all away
My dog ran off last weekend
Left the house and ain't come back
He ran off with that pack of dogs
And he ain't coming back
I bought him as a puppy
Now he's left and he's long gone
But he left a pile of rejection
On the corner of my lawn
Sitting in my trailer
Sleeveless shirt and cut off jeans
Chasing each tall *****
With some Jack and shots of Beam
Struggling with my issues
In the past and from today
Sitting in my trailer
Drinking my tomorrows all away
My tomorrow's may be better
But then again, I'm not so sure
I've got the blues from this rejection
And I don't think there's a cure
so I sit here in my trailer
Drinking the same thing every day
Sitting in my ripped t-shirt
Drinking all my tomorrows away
Sep 28, 2012
Sep 28, 2012 at 8:22 PM UTC
Swoon to a tearful night, unknown to its grief
Dialogue of peace, and those of plight
Ringing of morphology, raindrops on the roof.
Such things heard from the peasants’ seat
In the many wet heads sopping
In the sonorous waves, upright in the city clime
Untending to their beds.
At the bottom of that something
All told are destined they will find
Be pliable to the ills they’ve dealt
To carry on, to work, admonishments
Said once to justify these red romances
That in every rain storm melt
As pity through the night, forever unclasped
From shackles of their blame
Since life and ideology somehow are the same.
‘Tis destiny for abating storms
As some will rose from their thickened thorns
These nights deliver their gentle morns
All the same as hemlock grows as poison
And is best to be avoided.
How—this, I fear only rain my know—
Can we still bathe in fraternal glow
When some still heal from Death himself
Each breath that enters is quickly prayed to leave
High on seated thrones
Those mean so quick to thieving, the poor
The lazy deserve no quarter
Those dusty pockets afford not one
So steal the heart upon his sleeve.
May we help man wrought our kin and kind
By common tongue, free, as we are ought?
Since another may make my world
He is mine to protect, not throw to bytes
So ludicrous and feeding back upon themselves
For destiny can be remade
If hatred weren’t so blind.
Aug 14, 2014
Aug 14, 2014 at 8:36 AM UTC
I hired a robot
To write poems for me
Now I'm able to rhyme
In modern technology
Though his imagination
Isn't quite up to par
The relaxation I get
Outweighs it by far
From 0 to 1
To 1 0 1
He likes to write
In binary bytes for fun
As long as the rhymes
Keep flowing from him
He can have all that is mine
From the head of my pen
If all this goes well
We'll just wait and see
But I might even hire
A robot to read poems for me
Sep 22, 2016
Sep 22, 2016 at 9:12 AM UTC
After twenty years, as cursed as I may be
for having learned computerese,
I continue to examine bits, bytes and words
and insure that I'm one of those computer nerds.
Program design, source code and compile
followed by walk-throughs that place me on trial.
There's lots of testing - a means to an end
in hopes of avoiding future production abends.
There are micros, minis and mainframe hardware
which are made to work with in-house and vendor software.
Provided are many platforms for everyone to use
and assure misinformation in data's abuse.
Author Note:
Learn more about me and my poetry at:
www.squidoo.com/book-isbn-1419650513/
Oct 11, 2012
Oct 11, 2012 at 7:14 AM UTC
This is to the camera, that sees me as nothing but
Delicate bones and pearly whites
My essence captured through awkward captions and
My worth measured by likes and heart bytes
A photograph carefully composed
Of a girl with her true thoughts [boxed up tight]
This is to the boys who see me as nothing but
Geometric shapes
Circles and curves and parabolas
**** and *** and legs and waist
And an irrelevant concave where my brain should be
My “radical ideas” make me a butterface
This is to the academy, that sees me as nothing but
3.97 and a good SAT score
A scholar of great potential
That will donate millions or more
As an honored alumni
Of the greatest institution in the world
This is to society, that sees me as nothing but
A golden gal who always colored inside the lines
Mrs. Goody-Two-Shoes, no fire in my soles
“She’s never insubordinate, ‘cause she’s never been inclined”
Determined but docile
Go ahead and assume I’m not the rebellious kind
This is to myself, because I see that
My mind is a kaleidoscope of technicolor dreams
Ideas colliding like specks in sunbeams
And I’ll call myself a feminist or riot grrl if I **** well please
You are not my dictator or an office label machine
It’s 2015; I’ll be whatever the hell I want to be.
Mar 28, 2015
Mar 28, 2015 at 12:52 PM UTC
People plugged in everywhere
To ipods, games and phones
Like non-existent robots
The world is full of drones
We're now made up of circuit boards
We've lost all of our bones
Be different, and unplug yourself
Grow a pair of stones
Your life is electronic
on a tablet or a chip
You run your life remotely
you give people email lip
you wouldn't dare go jogging
you might fall and break a hip
Be different, and unplug yourself
And give technology the slip
A record made of vinyl
now it's just some bits and bytes
It's a relic in an antique store
Along with other sights
Like cameras using flashbulbs
when taking shots at night
Be different and unplug yourself
Show digital your might
It doesn't matter where you go
A text, you have to send
If you're going to the shopping mall
Or just walking 'round the bend
You've more holsters on your belt loop
Than gunfighters would depend
To hold onto their weapons
Before they met their end
Turn off the boxes, read a book
Do something that's old school
Don't follow all the others
Acting like a dumb pack mule
Don't rely on electronics
Just use it as a tool
Unplug yourself from everything
Be a leader not a fool
People plugged in everywhere
To ipods, games and phones
Like non-existent robots
The world is full of drones
We're now made up of circuit boards
We've lost all of our bones
Be different, and unplug yourself
Grow a pair of stones
Dec 28, 2012
Dec 28, 2012 at 4:23 PM UTC
This is
Almost all.
Cereal.
12 bites chocolate koala crispies
Chris along with some horizon
fat-free organic milk
but again 12 bytes.
Short stack flapjacks
Safeway maple syrup drenching it.
Patrick's IRA send it
One hot fudge sundae
from McDonald's
one half bite of hot fudge.
Six bytes of salsa recipe.
Four microwaved Chinese potstickers
Some HighC
orange lovers
I also ate Mark's soup
25 Cheetos
Xcessive?
I also ate some
of my accent.
One can Wolfgang Puck
used as a base
added some roasted
breast chopped
roughly 2 wings
scanner on onion
red rock refrigerator
did an onion
rings tile cut.
Think I know I'm
sorry sweetie
they are kind.
May 9, 2014
May 9, 2014 at 12:50 AM UTC
Honey.
12 bites chocolate koala crispies
Chris along with some horizon
fat-free organic milk
but again 12 bytes.
Short stack flapjacks
Safeway maple syrup drenching it.
Patrick's IRA send it
1 hot fudge sundae
from McDonald's.
1/2 bite of hot fudge
4 bites soft serve.
6 bytes of salsa recipe.
4 microwaved Chinese
potstickers some
HighC orange lovers
I create Mark's suit.
1 can Wolfgang Puck
used as a base
added some chicken
******* roasted
chopped roughly
Spoon cut.
2 wings
25 Cheetos
Xcessive?
I also ate
my accent.
Scan him some onion
red rock ringed
Reiterate Beings
tile cut.
Think I know I'm
sorry sweetie
they are kind
Of sinking.
May 9, 2014
May 9, 2014 at 1:06 AM UTC
holy worlds of culture lie undead,
divided, cocooned,
near and dear
in pristine
hermetically sealed jars.
profoundly deceased artists
greater generations
cryogenically frozen;
wait for disease no more,
erased and forgotten by history.
Make room for new records,
consciousness too
streaming through
your tube,
my tube,
our tube.
Cut and paste:
Save the **** save the pop-ups, save the ads,
save the text, save the papers, save the bits, save
the bytes, save the one, save the zero, save the site,
save the facts, save the mirrors, save the mother,
and the father, save the dots, save the
photos, save the mood, save your game,
save your thoughts, save the time, save the
plot, save this show, save the world, save
the breeze, save the key, save the music, save this song,
safe advice, save the space, save this spot,
save the ages, save the screen, save your pride,
save indulgence,
save your dream.
Oct 16, 2014
Oct 16, 2014 at 5:35 AM UTC
Of the items in the store,
All were second hand
An old computer did I buy,
With a broken stand
One side was badly scratched
Two knobs were missing too
But that’s not the story
I’m about to tell to you
T’was about the second week
Of the ‘puter at my place
Sitting there against the wall
Near the old staircase
I recall the night was late
As I readied me for bed
When I turned the ‘puter off,
The screen … it turned blood-red
The appearance caused a start
I gasped a breath of air
I couldn’t turn my gaze away
I stood right there and stared.
Then a low murmuring
From deep within the set
Cold chills ran over me
I’ve not forgotten yet
A voice, low and menacing
Containing graveled rasps
I could not then stop again
My involuntary gasp
I stood there mesmerized
My gaze remained transfixed
Thoughts racing through me
And all of them were mixed
The Voice on the other side
Of the blood-red display screen
Issued a command to me
So ominous and mean:
“Place your hand upon the screen
And repeat these words to me:
Where you are right now,
Is where I need to be.”
I felt my arm move upward
Powerless to resist
I felt a burning in my palm
As the display screen it kissed
I heard a voice and realized
The speaker it was me:
“Where you are right now,
Is where I need to be.”
As the words transmitted,
Involuntarily,
I could feel a change come on …
Overwhelming me.
As I stared in disbelief
My hand – it disappeared
Absorbed into the blood-red screen
As the burning onward seared …
Through my wrist, up my arm
It’s hotness I could feel
Inward was I screaming
Not believing this was real!
In reflection from the screen
I was being pulled into
I saw a face, and then I screamed:
“That horrid face is YOU!”
The rapid assimilation
Continued then until
All feelings were extinguished
And all was calm and still.
A trillion beings there transformed
To tiny bytes and bits
And ‘tis every part of us
All websites now transmits
Now here I am deep inside
This computers’ display screen
If there’s disturbance felt
Oh so sharp and keen
Just place your hand upon the screen
And read these words to me:
“Where you are right now,
Is where I need to be.”
Oct 14, 2015
Oct 14, 2015 at 7:30 AM UTC
Fingers and thumbs tapping out messages
so many texts written, so many read, smiles apart
faces, eyes, feelings, never shared
music videos; lips and music separate
empty sounds, never tugging the heart strings.
Thumbs and fingers keying in distance
so much data, so little experience shared, time apart
laptops, smart phones, processing emptiness
unfeeling, sampling blandness, subtleties lost
empty words, crowding our lives.
Curves, flowing lines and spaces, passion
compressed
squashed out are the senses
sweat and smells, laughter lost.
All in the empty kingdom of bits and bytes
reigned by the gods of technology
the mantra being faster, faster
but still
all fingers and thumbs in the affairs of the heart.
As surely as we are propelled forward
into tomorrow
we hurtle
back to the dark ages
the dark castles of aloneness
Empty words, lost in the cells of our separation
all fingers and thumbs.
Dec 6, 2013
Dec 6, 2013 at 5:25 AM UTC
Her crisp vocals paint paths, long poised by me.
Her beauty is a reality where my ecosystem drives.
Her omnidirectional audio reads every touch and feels every string.
Her heart-bytes pump voltage in my device(veins).
Her smartness is a safe place, where I shut down.
© Feelings Coated
Jul 13, 2019
Jul 13, 2019 at 7:49 AM UTC
Whenever people criticise me
They usually don’t know that
I am my Biggest Critic,
Beating myself up
Like Tyson Fury.
It’s how I spur myself on,
Hopefully to better things.
But what things?
I still don’t know.
Oh to have blind faith
And sense of Vocation
As many others do.
A solid set of Values.
A script to follow
Opinions to declare.
Instead I dither
Undecided
Lost in an ocean of ifs and buts.
Too bright and open-minded
For my own good.
Worse still, I’m oh so eager to please.
I think myself incorruptibly honest,
Yet the truth is,
I only tell people what I think
They want to know.
It’s how I was brought up.
But then again
Am I willing to fight
For what I stand for?
Should I really be Devil’s Advocate
Just to “stick up” for my views?
Better methinks to hold my counsel
Or be diplomatic
Which may be okay
So long as I actually decide
What I think and feel
Within myself.
And there’s the rub.
What do I stand for?
Do I really think for myself?
Like so many others,
Am I dragged along:
Brainwashed by Media hoo ha
And hype?
Superficial sound bytes
And rallying calls.
I need to search my soul
And find my true feelings
And beliefs.
I know that I Love Life
In most of its forms.
I’m all for Wellbeing
And The Common Good.
I need to focus
On these things:
On making the most of
This Paradise World
We seem bent on ruining.
In short
I must stoke those fires of Love
And enlighten others
To do the same.
Paul Butters
© PB 13\12\2021.
Dec 13, 2021
Dec 13, 2021 at 6:21 AM UTC
Way past 12
yet still I am awake
the world sin,
in a pen
conforming lights,
this is the world now?
digitized in bytes
digitized in bites and bytes.
we are ever distant, we don't
gaze at each other on these nights
we just digitize , digitize bytes
process instead of feel
and distract ourselves
forever encased in the mud of the machine.
Lets jump on the lifeboat
and find ourselves homes
to root in, not another boot that breaks the skin
Emote, and feel
don't process
with a zeal that begs
Mar 7, 2016
Mar 7, 2016 at 7:49 PM UTC
Life was void.
It’s she,
Opened the curly braces
Of my life;
My heart,
Imbibed the input –
Stream of her smiles;
The output – “<3 <3”
Got into an infinite loop
On the soul’s own console;
Sensing the love in return,
Jumped to the function – Life:
The Life with various parameters –
Joy, sorrow, warm, pain
Passed through a switch..
That returned “Love” on every case;
Life was full of snickers
At the mistakes of semicolons;
Making the bytes of sweet memories
Giga bytes to zetta bytes;
Now, the time,
As good code must,
Terminating with a graceful
End, Kissing her, Love!
Jun 12, 2020
Jun 12, 2020 at 1:16 AM UTC
Why are you so quick to believe
everything that you see
like water from a fountain without a filter?
Cannot there be a chance for speech to flow
and dissect the bits and bytes
of information?
NO
Instead feel by memory you will the others
who are of a second nature; not
those by heart.
We have stood on this rock
watching me dive deeper
into a screaming headache.
Aug 31, 2014
Aug 31, 2014 at 10:59 PM UTC