A Warm Arrangement
04:47
A warm arrangement sits at a table.
Mostly water.
Some carbon.
The remaining materials
would not trouble a hardware shop.
Cells continue their small employment.
Several have failed since midnight.
The arrangement retains its name.
04:48
Outside, weather descends
according to gravity.
Inside, a kettle performs
the same obedience differently.
Nothing was consulted.
The arrangement watches the glass.
It believes it is seeing rain.
Ultraviolet occupies the yard unseen.
Radio traffic passes through its chest.
A moth has another room.
04:49
The phone lights.
Her name.
Beneath it:
Are you coming tomorrow?
The thumb rests on the glass.
Its pulse alters.
Chemistry enters the discussion
without introduction.
The arrangement decides:
no.
The decision feels complete.
It has the usual weight of fact.
04:50
The kettle reaches its limit.
A switch gives way.
The arrangement pours water
into a chipped blue cup.
The cup once belonged to its father.
This cannot be detected
in the ceramic.
Another cup will not do.
04:51
A photograph stands
against the refrigerator door.
Five people are present.
One remembers the afternoon
as happy.
Another remembers
what happened before it.
The camera reports sunlight.
Its evidence is excellent.
04:52
The phone has gone dark.
The answer remains unsent.
Restraint, perhaps.
Punishment, perhaps.
The behaviour itself
does not provide a label.
Later accounts will.
04:53
The observer attempts
to locate the arrangement.
Skin proves temporary.
The gut keeps a population
absent from the legal name.
Memory alters its minutes.
Childhood persists
without retaining much of its matter.
The legal name survives this.
So far.
04:54
Elsewhere, the species measures stars
it cannot reach.
Marks written on boards
predict the conduct of matter.
Matter complies.
The authority remains unavailable.
04:55
The arrangement searches
for its glasses.
They are beside the phone.
04:56
The device knows where it slept.
The government knows
another version.
A dog would use smell.
The arrangement accepts
whichever account is useful.
04:57
The moth has entered the sink.
Its wings strike porcelain.
A finger is lowered.
The moth climbs aboard.
For several seconds
the larger animal waits.
The window opens.
The moth leaves.
Nothing was requested.
04:58
Ants have found sugar.
A cloth passes
across the bench.
Several movements stop.
The cloth is rinsed.
The pulse does not alter.
04:59
The phone lights again.
The same name.
No new message.
The arrangement reads
the old one.
Are you coming tomorrow?
The earlier decision
has lost jurisdiction.
The room is unchanged.
The blood is not.
The thumb hovers
above the glass.
05:00
PERSON requires assumptions.
HUMAN requires more.
Outside,
water continues down the window.
The cup cools.
The dead ants remain where they fell.
The moth does not return.