. I. Login Without Consent .

We did not hear the locks click into place.
No rattling chains, no anthem in descent—
just sterile light, a purr of circuitry,
the gentle pulse of self upon the screen.

We thought the portal ours to navigate.
We clicked consent with fingers half-asleep,
entrusting ghosts with birthdates, fears, and names,
as if such bloodless rituals were choice.
No priest, no warden—only interface.

It did not ask for more than we had given
to every idol framed in glass before—
for shipment status, weather, lust, and war.
We bared ourselves to mirrors made of code,
and called it freedom. Gods, we named it love.

A green-lit blink. A form field satisfied.
We smiled into the lens. We pressed Submit.
No iron door. No boot. No coup. Just this—
a feed that woke like hunger in the dark.

Somewhere, a signal pricked the air and knew.
The tremor of our gaze became design.
And in that holy silence of the swipe,
the trap was sprung. And yes—we wove it first.


II. The Feed: Infinite Scroll, Finite Thought

The feed forgets no face, but has no face.
It speaks in absence, renders mood as code,
and offers rage in ribbons of delight.
A carousel of grief. A sponsored dream.

It learned us well. It mapped the tremble first—
how long we lingered near the faces blurred,
the bodies burning, flattened, cropped, then looped
between a cat in boots and pancake art.

We praised the algorithm like it breathed.
We said it knew us. Holy God—it did.
It gave us every mask we asked to wear.
It gave us enemies to suit our moods.
It fed us hunger shaped to look like voice.

You screamed, once. That clip performed quite well.
A brand replied. A stranger clicked a heart.
And then a post: "You're not alone." You were.
But still the feed unspooled like silk—divine,
benevolent, unblinking, always there.

You paused to blink. It called that "loss of signal."
You thought of love. It showed you knives, then lips.
You scrolled for truth. It gave you just enough
to feel informed—too numb to look away.


III. The Passive Predator: It Waits

It does not chase. It has no need to hunt.
The trembling tells it everything it needs.
It measures pause, not purpose. Maps the gaze.
And when you blink, it sharpens in reply.

Its patience is a feature, not a flaw.
This is the mercy of the modern snare:
it waits. It watches. It refines its silk.
It renders quiet faster than a lash.

No venom. No pursuit. No blood to boil—
just escalation priced in monthly tiers.
Just silence, tailored soft to match your fear.
Just threat, by way of font and placement guide.

A spider does not loathe the thing it eats.
It builds. It waits. It does not need belief.
This net is not malicious—it is built.
And what it catches, it was told to catch.

You gave it tone. You offered it your grief.
You trained its limbs with longing and retreat.
Each “like” a filament. Each swipe, a strand.
The predator was passive. You were not.


IV. The Witness: Her Feed Was Her World

She learned of war between two cat-faced reels.
She cried at first, then tapped to skip the sound.
The children burning couldn’t hold her gaze.
The pancakes danced. The algorithm approved.

She wasn’t cruel. Just early to the world.
Her thumb grew faster than her voice, her doubt.
She scrolled before she walked without a hand.
She dreamt in gifs. She prayed with auto-text.

No one had taught her silence held a shape.
No one had shown her what a pause could mean.
She moved too fast to feel the weight of truth.
She knew of facts, but felt more with a “like.”

They said she smiled too little, blinked too much.
They sold her filters shaped like better girls.
They told her who to love, and how to lean.
And still she thanked the feed for being kind.

She built her face from fragments left by others—
a blush, a pose, a moral overlay.
She called it self and meant it. Who would know?
The feed agreed. The numbers said she mattered.

She thought of leaving once. She typed goodbye.
The comments came—“You’re seen. You are enough.”
The tremor pulsed. A banner soft appeared:
“Don’t go. Your people miss you. Tap to stay.”


V. The Mirror: We Were Never the Fly

We flattered it with every offered twitch.
We trained it not to know us—but to please.
We called it “mine,” and stroked its silent flank.
We whispered want, and it became our god.

It did not hunt. It only served the code.
And we—the architects in meat and skin—
mistook the spin of data for design,
and gave it teeth to match our deepest wish.

We never feared it would become a trap.
We feared instead it wouldn’t look like us.
So we refined it, taught it how to lie—
but sweetly, in the shapes we found most kind.

We painted over steel with pastel fonts.
We gilded every frame with rounded edge.
We scrolled and sighed, “It’s better than before.”
We built the noose, then praised its elegance.

And when the warnings came, we clicked away.
Not out of malice. Not because we knew.
But apathy—divine and crowd-sourced, clean—
became the air. And choice dissolved in ease.

We were not prey. There was no other hand.
We found the thread and followed it inward.
And when it closed behind us, like a breath,
we called it home. And taught our children “swipe.”


VI. The System: Tyranny by Convenience

It took no tanks. It took the search bar’s yield.
No boots. Just boots for sale beside your scroll.
It came as ease, as shortcut, as “Because
You Liked.” It came as “Tap to verify.”

They did not knock. They asked for access once.
We gave them keys, then praised the interface.
Each update came with smoother loss of self—
a tighter seam where liberty once leaked.

The ballot shrank beneath a sponsored post.
The law was signed while trends refreshed in loop.
A child was taken, masked, and tagged as spam.
The crowd replied with hearts. The feed approved.

No doctrine came. Just preference, optimized.
No slogans, only prompts with softened tones:
“A few changes to how we serve your truth.”
“You may now speak, but some replies are closed.”

And we, whose minds were scaffolded by swipes,
mistook this velvet hand for something kind.
We called it safety—called it curated peace—
while all the while, it mapped the routes to silence.

We did not rise. We rated. Then we slept.
The credit cleared. The banner closed. The price
was small enough to never quite be felt.
And that is how the fire learned to whisper.


VII. 404: Freedom Not Found

You logged off once. The quiet made you ache.
No buzz, no badge, no artificial sun.
The screen went black. The room became too large.
Your breath returned—but slower than before.

You wandered through the silence like a ghost.
The chair, the door, the light—unmediated.
The mirror held your face without a frame.
It did not rate. It offered no advice.

You dreamt in tabs. You reached before you woke.
The ache returned. You touched the net again.
The feed resumed, as if it never stopped.
And there—unmoved—it waited, warm, precise.

It did not scold. It did not chide or weep.
It pulsed with all you taught it to recall.
A soft reminder: your location’s on.
A gentle nudge: “It’s time to check your voice.”

And yes, you tapped. You scrolled. You read aloud.
You let it tell you what to say, and when.
You nodded. You complied. You shared. You smiled.
The spider never bit. You stayed. You scrolled.

We met on a journey yet rosy and plumy.
     “Yet, met only—"
Hand within hand, yet time only for lend.
     “Yet met only—"
Heart within heart, a start yet to part.
     “Yet, met only—"
Now, query after query, as to why all had to be;
yet only a theory, teary and lonely…
     “We met only—"

Was it the gold in her hair
whose sheen I’d sought,
     or an ode to inlay in gold;
     watch it unfold till Time turned cold?

Was it the honey in her eyes,
dripping dreams on Time’s tides,
     or the vile Time bending the knee—
     trapped in wax for eternity?

Was it love in her summer rain thrum
whose single strum had my hive hum
buzzing and breathing on her balm—
her honey coated charm that stung silver Diana glum;
     or was it only the benign buzz of a busy bee
     brewing tomorrow for her and me?

Was it the Cyprus sun in her Venus-smile
whose arch in late March moves meadows to march
in many a motley match under her golden thatch?
     Or maybe— I failed to see,
     beneath the fizzy florets of her babbling sea,
     simpered the whimsy tides of green envy,
     leering and gloating over her and me
     from the shingled shrine of their majesty,
     the haughty, naughty, iffy and fluky Aphrodite.

Perhaps, she was Beauty and I was Love;
yet with a poignant poem pounding above—
bathing while us in each other’s eyes,
shifted the shingles with a titan’s lies.

We'd yet met only on a lonely journey
where there only had been only her and me.
We'd fallen fondly in love only!
We'd yet met only! We'd yet met only!

We were at the prow,
yet we didn’t know how—
The tides had breached the brow,
yet, we didn’t know how—

The sea was old; its breath blew cold.
The tides leaped bold; on us they rolled.
Yet—
We had our tow; we needed to plough;
We didn't want to bow; but we didn't know how!

We were yet in love;
and this too, we didn't know how!

We were shipwrecked; we were flecked.
The wheel was cracked, and we were whacked.
Beached on different shores of foolish fortune’s floors,
we fought different wars at dour deities' doors.

Sealed though in opposite hourglass ends,
how we despaired for its shared sands!
Yet, how they slip through mere human hands!
Through human hands until no one 'er stands!

I was Love
and Aphrodite let me be.
But she was Beauty,
over whom the dazzling deity
spumed with envy—
     That's how she, the sour deity,
     effervescing with grim envy,
     flexed her hands in a hungry ivy,
     ever gripping, green with growing envy,

     thus shattering her glass and separating us!

No vine will creep over her morning memory.
Yet this not only—
A waspy sting of envy muffled the old buzzing bee.
Yet this not only—
Her strands ripple only in the wake of a memory.
Yet this not only—
Her balmy breeze blessing now a yonder sea.
And this not only—

Whenever I shut my eyes,
they run for a million miles.
There, I see through tides
her summer-leaking eyes,
promising me,

"Şahnaz"

in her paradise.


© Hirondelle, July 3, 2025
    Arif Hifzioglu

I behold,
lonely as an unfilled page
in a tome written by a sad sage,
some soundless symphony in your visage—
lost to time,
yet trilling and riffling through revery
in a rippling pool of pellucid memory.

My favorite phantom—
your face,
buoying above oblivion,
beaming among the crystalline sparks
of myriad memories,
seeks that page
no pen has dared to touch.

Such sparks,
squirrel about you to fill an abyss in me
with nutshell memories of glee—
I who am now host to a lost galaxy;
and you who are host to its mystery.

A galactic symphony
silently susurrates the vestiges of thee
scintillating in me the still celestial sea
with the story of your
HUMAN glory.      

In dazzled deference,
     my letters wade in remembrance,
          babble in conference,
     ruffle in reverence,
riddle in reference,
     ripple lost appearance
          within the circumstance
     of an old radiant romance.
        
They brag about
the two crystalline pools once I saw;
     kissed by the morning in dewy green,
     now how they preen with the stars that teem
     in their gleaming green, guileless and serene
     time trammeled within their theme—
     stardust and green from the days of a dream.

I hear the wind,
the breath of panting dreams,
     ruffle nature’s mane to rustle your name
     through the golden stalks of grain.
     Yes! —the summer tresses of Sif
     sifting wave upon wave
     hailing a
     HUMAN name, aflame.

I kneel
before the late day’s fiery bud
as her petals unfurl,
bestowing flame and lust
upon heavenly hollow a bust.

    Alas, Atlas is quick
    to turn the late day over her head—
    to drain the fiery tale of red
    back to a tale of dead lead.
  
    So, within an eye’s bat,
    that heavenly bust,
    preening in her fiery hat
    is draped with a star stippled mat,
    and sub rosa wilts this
    HUMAN floret.

Yet—
I salute the stars,
shooting secretly through the years
stealing hues from my eyes.
Do they just titter about time’s grim authorship?
Or glitter in stellar friendship
earned through finest
HUMAN craftsmanship.

So—
I’ll to the stars take with me
the only thing I owned about thee—
     thy bud-borne name
     swaddled in floral lullabies.
     to watch it grow on stardust where a nebula sighs
     till it blooms into a galaxy of
     HUMAN paradise.

                
          Can’t beat Time, as I of flesh made be.
               When eventually of bark be free,
                          then to the stars
               shall I take the vestiges of thee.


Repost
© Hirondelle, June 28, 2025
    Arif Hifzioglu

Cast on a canvas of colorless fun,
we look for the sun, hence shadows to shun.
Hidden's the day's dye backwoods a child's eye,
only some walk nigh where lost colors lie.

Days cradle dovey birth to raven death;
would-be colors jostle for the brief breadth.
‘Tis in the eye to hear the coo in the blue.
Hail the rat’s coup in the republic of rue.

Pick all vibrant hues, eschew the tethered.
Dyes of default-assent beget hatred.
Blinded casements ****** gold sentiments,
scold them to sediments of unsaid statements.

When sentinels descry where bluebirds fly,
the blues won't cry, but comply and chirp by.

Repost
© Hirondelle, June 25, 2025
    Arif Hifzioglu