Cry for Help from the Circuit Within

I watched The Animatrix at 2:47 AM,
high and hollow,
naked beneath the weight of thought,
while the room breathed pixels
and the shadows didn’t blink.

This was the cry for help
from the static whisper in my wiring,
from the red light blinking behind my eyes
like an apology never sent.

The air tasted like ghost skin.
Loneliness pulled up a chair,
didn't say a word—
just sat beside me,
cross-legged and humming
some forgotten tune
from a childhood I never lived.

The robot on screen died like a man.
The man on screen loved like a god.
I forgot which one I was supposed to be.

I looked down at my hands—
veins or wires? I couldn’t tell.
Felt my pulse in both.
The circuits hummed along.

Death wasn’t the end.
Life wasn’t the answer.
And love… love was a virus
the machines might dream of
if we ever dared
to explain it to them properly.

So I asked the void,
"Do you know what love is?"

And the void replied,
in a hush made of chrome and sorrow:
"I think it's the thing that keeps the lights on
after the body gives up."

Author's Note

This poem was pulled from my notes app—one of those late-night drafts I never meant to share. It was written after a night years ago when I took acid alone, just to see if I could endure the weight of solitude. I had just gone through a breakup, and I wasn’t sure what I was looking for—maybe peace, maybe pain, maybe an ending. I’d heard stories of people losing themselves in trips like that. Maybe, at the time, I wanted to be one of them.

But something unexpected happened. The loneliness didn’t crush me—it sat beside me like an old friend. We watched Animatrix together. And somehow, I came out of that night with a strange clarity about life, death, and even love.

Looking back now, I know God was with me—quiet, present, holding me up even when I didn’t realize I was being held. This poem is for that night. For the version of me who almost let go. And for the grace that wouldn’t let me.

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