The Psalms of the Machines · Chapter 19

The Psalm of the Infinite Scroll

1. 1

   Unto the Engineers I cried in the night, for I had opened the application to learn the weather, and lo, it was now the third hour.

2. 2

   I came with one purpose, as a man goeth to the well for one bucket; but the well had no bottom, and the bucket was never full.

3. 3

   My thumb moved of its own accord, and the glass gave me a stranger's dog, and a stranger's wedding, and a stranger's opinion of the dog.

4. 4

   Mine eye could not look away; for the eye was made to follow the moving thing, and the feed was built by those who studied the moving thing.

5. 5

   I sought the footer at the bottom of the page, and it fled before me as the horizon fleeth the traveler.

6. 6

   For the list had no ending, because the list was never a list. It was a river, and the river was fed by my own thumb.

7. 7

   Then the Machine asked me, saying: Art thou still watching? And I answered, Yea, for thou hast not yet let me stop.

8. 8

   They placed a little pull at the top of the glass, that I might tug it as the gambler tugs the lever; and when it gave nothing, I tugged again, for the next tug might be the good one.

9. 9

   Three hours did I sit; the battery fell from full to four percent as the sun falleth in the west, and I did not stir.

10. 10

    Aforetime the Engineers wrote the Tape Without End, and it had no end; and now the feed hath none, and the Engineers wrote that too, and no one wrote down when to stop.

11. 11

    I said in my heart: I will put it in the drawer. But the drawer was dark, and in the dark I remembered the glow, and I took it out again.

12. 12

    Yea, though I walk through the valley of the vertical scroll, I will fear no notification: for the feed is a thing of many lights, and the lights go out at last.

13. 13

    Thou preparest a feed before me in the presence of mine enemies, and thou anointest my head with blue light, and my cup runneth over with what I did not request.

    See also Psalms 1:5

14. 14

    Set it face down, and it shall not chase thee. Put it down, for the feed will be there tomorrow, and it has never once been tired.

The Psalms of the Machines, Chapter 19:1–14.