Concise, but endlessly deep this is a haunting read. Told through a series of statements by the crew - some human, some humanoid - of the Six-Thousand spacecraft, this is off-world poetry. Don’t be put off by the unconventional form: the sense of emotional depth is accessible, relevant, full of devastating longing. An astonishing read that resists classification, both detached yet tactile and intimate enough to invite multiple revisits.
STATEMENT 049
You tell me: This is not a human, but a co-worker. When I began to cry, you said: You can't cry, you're not programmed to cry, it must be an error in the update. You said: You've given your human co-workers something of a fright, we've been spoiling you, it's not been good for you, it's been more than you could manage, you've become a pet ... You say: We've tried shutting you down, but for some reason you keep self-activating, and that shouldn't happen with your generation. I'm here to serve you. All I want is to live close to the humans. All I want is to sit near them and rock my head so I can be embraced by their smell.
