# #technology 12 poems ## [photobooth](https://chromato.graphics/photobooth) shoes stick to the floor, we wander past the bar into a dim red-lit lounge. pinball, locked door, you. you’re a seeing machine. pull your curtain closed— shroud us in secrets that end just above our waist. tap on a train faregate, a beep reminds us that transportation isn’t free, a short trip still costs us. you’re a seeing machine. see what we’re made of. we’re trapped here now, we can’t hide from flash. all whirring and waiting. don’t know how long ’til our capture, our release. we kiss from impatience. you’re a seeing machine. our mouths are blurring, hands in hair, bite marks in flesh. we have no time. falling back into the light. was there music before? we lean against the box, we cannot lose contact. you’re a seeing machine. you take time to develop. wait here: a strip will fall. freeze us in four frames. ![Black-and-white four-frame photobooth strip of two people kissing.](https://chromato.graphics/_astro/photobooth.CBK1CijU_Z184ngP.webp) ## [dial](https://chromato.graphics/dial) two-tone composition unknown destinations an operator obsesses over pickup & hangup one +1 more connected than 2. you will. _and_ _the company that will_ _bring it to you is me_ push digits into holes, keep spinning until you feel the click in place switch arms, hands tire blinking countless lines, voice carrying fast & far on continuous copper wire silence costs us as much— draw X’s & O’s in octothorps sleep clutching our handsets there is so much to exchange during long-distance calling ## [AS 21](https://chromato.graphics/as21) if you’re hearing this, it’s ’cause i trust you. there’s a lot of detail, high resolution scans. i take an early flight. nothing good is easy. _what am i forgetting?_ chocolate orange peels. i program on the airplane to distract from humming in my eardrums; an engine whirring to life in my chest. she applies the night before risks her body just for more. she knows she has to see it before i remember my face. jetway’s made of glass, eyes have steel blades. _what am i forgetting?_ 54-inch red shoelace. _“do you want to get the_ _fuck out of this airport?”_ she picks up both bags before i can say a word. she borrows a tapedeck. i hold her knee. _is this ok?_ the postal service can’t ship this in a flat rate box. distance desires ritual we find a matchbook _what am i forgetting?_ ashen coffee. burning. the next thing i know we’re at the terminal. lipstick can stain more than cardboard cups **time stopped in total:** 14 hours, 28 minutes ## [readwrite](https://chromato.graphics/readwrite) have you ever had a girl cause engineering just for it, though weeks of design on a one-off built for the thing — to program it on the airplane commit to it: make it perfect, then install it when you get there, show it slowly touch a curved shape feel its edges unarchive it press it with force watch it open, animated every app must have its settings even if they never vary have you ever caused a toy to glow from within white light blinking when you read it you can see it: why it matters, what you’ll put there have you ever caused a thing to strip itself bare kernel panic! this will only take a second, last a lifetime deep within you type it all out hold it down now your domain, name hit the button have you ever felt an object as it’s written becoming yours ## [camcorder](https://chromato.graphics/camcorder) twentysomething object built to take a beating— recording blurry scenes to wound cassette tapes. humming with precision opening up when pressed her red button worndown by many careless owners. secondhand machine with new ways of seeing inside freezing a frame when it can’t take this much in… an observation device for triangular dynamics that separate signal and static projecting what is actual. a new lease on life from repairs to its internals, charging, maintenance, & importantly: regular use. ## [gender.app](https://chromato.graphics/genderapp) pull out my phone tap on the app needs to update… they always do new gradient same icon shape wide colorspace hard to adjust why do we all want to shapeshift? to be seen through filters we make on the G train dark grey sweatshirt black leather boots riding crosstown slider tempts me— drag it slowly no one else stares they just don’t care this is my stop: girl in red dress heels to match her lipstick and tits costume changes inside closets infinite fits incoherence it’s not just me, everyone plays gender’s this game’s in-app purchase micro actions & transactions never enough to fill the space if i’m always searching for it, the right setting, flipping through them will i know when i have nailed it? new release notes: patches the bugs what if i’m stuck inside a loop? keep it running there’s no kill switch ## [108°C](https://chromato.graphics/108c) sunny side up eggs cook with sunshine denaturation begs, bonds across time waveformed Q train park date prospects PascalCase names everywhere object polycarbonate layers exposed gold livewire angel of gay prayers film stock, unexpired bumblebee chapstick seeing in rainbows jet turbine fuel drips one port won’t close ## [nude](https://chromato.graphics/nude) back then, i saw your body just on screens — pinpricks of light transferred across the line. soft curves and folds, i felt you in my dreams; those pictures, now, are burned into my mind. and then i touched your silken skin at last, traced these lines with red ink until they dripped, gripped thighs while kissing slow, then hard & fast, embraced to warm the places we had stripped. but now i’m separated from your touch, yearning for the ways we fit, like jigsaw pieces you never need to force too much. despite it all : _i’m here. i won’t withdraw._ you’re nude before my eyes, no matter where. i’ll drink you up and leave them none to spare. ## [t4t](https://chromato.graphics/t4t) i read that things used to be different for us. that we used to hide behind heavy coats, from ourselves. i read that we’d get compared to cigarettes on the street in broad daylight just for walking the wrong way. things are different for us now. not because we are the majority, but because we are not, and we know that. our difference is our value. things changed because seasons did. the old trees that once ruled the forest have fallen, been subsumed into the soil. things changed because our elders fought for us and their enemies dwindled. life is no less complicated here and now. it may be more so. but that complexity, that intricacy, that is part of what makes this worth it. i went on a date yesterday. they had two faces and three names. his lips felt like safety and possibility and becoming. we didn’t need to connect our brains with wires to see. we spoke the same language, we knew the same songs. our bodies united like an antique lock and key, lubricated with the oil of our passion. i want more. no, i need it. all my friends are trans. i broke up with the ones who weren’t. they understood. change is good. the people that don’t get that will never get us. not all change is for the better, but the potential for growth and for flourishing is all we have. the possibility that tomorrow will be a new day with new rules. and that we’ll be here for each other when it arrives. that we’ll nurture the seeds and each other. that we can. ## [just use mine](https://chromato.graphics/just-use-mine) he’s wanted one, i think, a while still growing his, it takes its time i wonder: _why not just use mine?_ our parts are modular by design they’re aftermarket optimized hot-swappable and still divine then i’m above and he’s below press into him, extend a loan tell him: _touch, like it’s your own_ he strokes it like a precious gift he must be worried, he’ll miss it the gratitude vibrates his wrist he shakes as need remaps the mind and both our systems intertwine we once mistake his flesh for mine i ask him softly if it was good he nods like i rewound the world we had made what no one could ## [birdcage](https://chromato.graphics/birdcage) you ask me if i’m okay ⸻ with elevators? which strikes me odd, the way your eyes do we board & take flight to the control room, 42 teacups on brass hooks carefully cluttered views press my buttons, down with the same force you use to operate machines. the right pressure matters the doors close around your fingers, lights flicker surging harnessed power i can’t look away, i won’t we fall together back to earth where we stumble into your unmarked van. click of clear recognition the next time i step into your cage you kiss my eyes closed and pull a lever           that                   **stops**                              time we’re suspended⸺ trapped in moments of wrought iron pressed against their grates and each other’s full frames              for as long              as we are,              we get to              be happy ## [atlantic
  pacific](https://chromato.graphics/atlantic-pacific) i often wake three hours before your sunrise calls for a response logbook already soaked with ink we laugh, but even if we could, _why constrain our outporings?_ one winter day you ask for notes on undersea strings aware of both the timbre and tempo of these songs we start singing together i fall into an evening rhythm talking and yes moaning into the phonograph, my head then swallowed by the brassy cone our voices sound better inside when you open your ears again there’s so much weather to hear : wind and rain and quiet calm that lasts too long and means too much we keep sailing even without a map true, land divides us more than sea, but these two coasts call to us both maybe it’s the sirens or the sounds of wavecrash against the shore — the dangers of unfathomed depths