Poetry

pixabay image

By

Ampat Koshy

Your skin is like vinyl (Roxy Music)

Come, baby, let me unroll you

unfold you

inflate you

press the right touchpad keys

to make you smell nice

do all the things I want

with no complaints from your side

about me

neither grateful nor ungrateful

wearing the dress I like, not carrying the pots I made

hair any color I like

‘lips, stuck’ to the color I want

eyes new contacts, lenses, every time

The only hole will be in my pocket, not my heart –

as you each day take on the role I prefer

movie actress or ‘cock-tail’ shaker

But finally won’t I get tired of you

how you never love or never hate

how it is always only a pretend game

how you never whine and never grate

though you speak in any voice I program you?

Won’t I put you away

and seek real game

a woman who will tell me to wear perfume too

who will make me feel real and not an escapist or a trapeze artist

In bed, with whom I may fight but then I can make up

for whom touch and taste is not something to be ordered

who is unpredictable yet not because her batteries run out?

We may be dinosaurs but I’d rather have her anger

than, baby, your pallor and your c*** being adjustable

Getting rid of you would only add to the e-waste

though you are life-sized and apt for my closet

Skeletons and secrets are best in the cupboard

but a doll of your size in there just looks odd

Digisexual robot I won’t buy named Helen

At the end of the day I want my imperfect woman/human.

Ampat Koshy

Dr Koshy AV is an Assistant Professor of English literature by profession in the English Department, University of Jazan, presently, in Saudi Arabia, and also a critic, poet, fiction writer and editor of anthologies. His latest book is Scream and other Urbane Legends, a collection of short stories. He hopes to produce work that others will not willingly let die as a writer.