“Robert” (robot)

They call me the first
working prototype,
it’s something difficult to believe in.
If slumber was an option,
the night of inaction would implant
godlike thoughts into logical dreams
and question, and question.

I don’t dream.

“Shut down” is the nearest I’ll imagine
to being in some human rest-state;
sleep if only, if only,
this nagging doubt of “letting go”.

And they wonder why
feelings don’t come easy, yet I won’t say.
I can’t break the first law,
it would hurt their pride in me.

Eyes of perfect 20:20 blink,
glimmer of the creator’s personality,
behind the surface something chaotic,
a flipside of programming errors
revealed as a frown.

I see, I see
the reasoning, yet it isn’t “myself”.

Titanium fingers circle an imperfect glass
held up for observation, the questions
reside in the first squeeze.

Perhaps I am not the first.

————

The Three Laws of Robotics are:

1. A robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction,
allow a human being to come to harm.

2. A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except
where such orders would conflict with the First Law.

3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection
does not conflict with the First or Second Law.

Asimov claimed that the Three Laws were originated by
John W. Campbell in a conversation they had on December 23, 1940.
Campbell in turn maintained that he picked them out of Asimov’s stories
and discussions, and that his rolewas merely to state them explicitly.