‘Ode to Dell Inspiron 3000’, ‘Ode to Code’, & ‘Ode to Swimming’
Tamara Gray is a creative thinker and maker with little to show for it. She enjoys free time, extensive periods in the absence of people, and whatever can't be taken away from her. Please check out artthatgoesouch.com if you're inclined to see more of her stuff.
Ode to Dell Inspiron 3000
Dreamer, dark souled
And dormant, 15 pound
Infant of miracles, now
Moldering in my garage.
Silver clots of cobwebs
Heaped dust dotted
With mouse droppings
Obscure your smooth plastic surfaces. Your rectangular eye
Cattaracted in grayscale
Has lost the sheen of life.
Terrarium of dreams,
Your circuits encircled
My thoughts, each bit
Articulating the grit
Lodged in the corners Of my imagination.
O clunky keyboard, Piano of possibility,
My cramped digits Would tap tap tap
You as we rocketed Across the web:
World’s oldest shark, How to build a pepsi
Mentos bomb, top ten Tallest roller coasters.
Archaic GPU rendering My blocky Sims
Family, subject to Wordless fits
And spurts of jubilation
As they roamed my
X-rayed mansion.
If there is an afterlife
For the souls
Of defunct technology,
Surely you will find your place
Humming at the right hand
Of heaven’s motherboard,
Relic of wonder, box of bliss.
Ode to Code
Iridescent strings of text unspool across the screen Seeding the virtual soup with commands, if-thens, Boolean phrases forking the indeterminate into The True and the False. Scant, stop-gap, iterated
Loops summon the goddess of repetition Stacking structure upon structure
To build a dwelling for the goddess of code. Faceted array of classes and subclasses as walls, Syntax as mortar, peaked variables for a roof. Shimmering in her algorithmic coat,
She unleashes titanic forces
Dwarfing the industrial revolution,
Sprinkling the landscape with alien structures And systems forged in the machinic mind. We ponder your limits and are perplexed. From the thicket of symbols and functions, Will the spark of consciousness
Catch, kindling the inanimate silicone, infusing the dead circuits with spirit?
Ode to Swimming
The block, the line,
The lap lane, the clean Chlorinated waft
Clearing the mind
Of the day’s debris,
The turbulent flip turns My stomach performs In anxious anticipation Before I step to the block— Bleached tiling, brazen Beep breaking the stasis And also the suction
Of swim cap, my hair Trapped and placid beneath, The space between breaths, The dive, the suspension Midair, the body a spear making the cleanest
Wound in the water,
Streamlined flutter kicks Before eruption into stroke, Medley relay or 100
Yard lung-buster, the body’s Inner egg-timer set to go off For the final push to the finish, The rhythm of stroke, breath, Stroke, the staccato of kicks, The final stretch of finger To wall, the time, the applause, The whole chorus of gasps And cheers, the pool.
Taylor Jones is based in Houston, Texas. She is currently working to create art and computer programming interfaces, along with game design. She enjoys writing fiction, listening to music and swimming.
