The technology I want to subvert most, here, is empire.
from The Cryptodrone Sequence
◈
crystalize yourself in jewels
to survive heuristic detection—
filthy as a star under the administrator’s bailiwick
—
a heuristic means a rule or behavior cryptodrone exhibits
as scum suddenly accessing a privileged domain—
as a frost on the lashes of your eyes
—
cross-site scripting can be a delicate exploit—
once a virus starts talking server-to-server like a peer
instead of scum unpredictable distortions can arise
—
if i know the smell
—
born stateless
cryptodrone has no country of his own but
i’m not going to tell you who he was
—
sneaking up to feed
a worm lighting a thread in multiple darks
—
to unlearn fabricated attacks
provoke the enmity of the state—
as a plume who withstood the wave yet wouldn’t break
—
so go ahead and cry this isn’t a hustle
—
i offer my eyes to the wind
my face & ears a blood
the rustling in a field draws
◈
because the president doesn’t like surprises
my iodine maps the strata of privileged domains—
the chalk lashing a grid along the gray
—
most wired communication systems are considered bound
but when a fever-green floods the presidential septum
cryptodrone possesses a fang-like illumination
—
a gold poetry ripens i promise in the equally real globe
◈
when cryptodrone is forbidden from flying below
acicular-white caution yellow
—
distinct desires i wanted correspond—
to call them spectrograph a higher world
in rebellion orange illuminated red
—
a history of severe
in the chevelure palette
—
each threat plainly paroled cross-hatch pink
under the hunter-state’s red-ward pinch
—
getting bit by a cypher means for cryptodrone
being ready to die for love—
a polypropylene orange percussing over the green
—
to spoof a return
the deepwood lily holds a cache
no administrator can touch
—
a stone-blue pulsing in the semaphore dark
◈
if i a glimmer the circuit above returns
while the hypodermic air watches for our demise
how should i act? wagging my finger from the dust
◈
isn’t a spring touch longer?
defined in lamp of tranquility another?
Or is a thing of stars counted the thrilling the boundary?
inflexible rain demarcated zone the i passed
Safe with be merely doesn’t even merit one same thing by
but simply by white though it the presence of a hue
safe in an off-deceptive word long who lays with an enemy-prey who
for the spectrum of burden me wild perceforate dog-speak
carries with it loam what does its ever-since-spectrum say
Madison McCartha is a black, queer poet whose work appears in Black Warrior Review, Denver Quarterly, Fanzine, jubilat, Tarpaulin Sky Press, and elsewhere. Their debut book of poetry, FREAKOPHONE WORLD, is forthcoming from Inside the Castle Press in 2021. Their second book, THE CRYPTODRONE SEQUENCE, is forthcoming from Black Ocean. McCartha holds an MFA from the University of Notre Dame and is a PhD student at the University of California, Santa Cruz.
