Oh You Robot Saints! by Rebecca Morgan Frank

What a delightful book! Oh You Robot Saints! by Rebecca Morgan Frank is filled with poems about automata and robots, sure, but the interaction with and creation of these machines shows very human desires and interests. The book contains poems about the creation of these machines from as far back as they are recorded, interspersed with poetry about death and longing, especially the longing to create human life through birth. The creators need to create “life” in order to fill spaces of loneliness and loss. This book contains heartache and humor. It’s the most human. Buy here.

From “Descartes’ Daughter”

You can recreate such tiny dimensions,

can even make the body move. Mold

hollow ears to speak to, comb

her hair, locks made out of the real thing.

Encased in a wooden box, she sailed

to Sweden with him, her automaton

girl-body build by his grieving hands—

his own Francine had died at only five. . . .

From “Virgen de los Reyes Automaton, 13th century”

. . . You are a set of wooden joints, built

spineless, taking our prayers, pardoning

our sins at your whim. I’m sick of you

parading each turn of your head.

Why were you made in imitation of us,

if we are meant to be more like you?

Still, the way your elbow bends, your head bows—

it moves me to watch you move.

From “Loving the dead is what we are here for”

. . . Above

the windowsill a line of red ants makes its way

somewhere—towards the leftover cheese plate,

across the folds of your trousers, into your ear.

They are driven by the scent of death.

My mother taught me this, to remove

the tiny corpse from the house. The dead

are a road map. . . .