The Machine That Ate Meaning

They told us we must leave something behind.

That a life unremembered

was a life unlived.

And we,

soft, trembling—

believed them.

We called it legacy.

We called it purpose.

We whispered the words

like prayer

with one eye open.

Somewhere, the Machine

watched.

Listened.

Waited.

Not a screen.

Not a device.

But a current in the walls.

A warmth in ambition.

A mouth with no face

and endless hunger.

It never asked.

We came on our own.

A moment,

unfiltered.

A memory,

still breathing.

A joy

we hadn’t yet rehearsed.

We offered them like flowers.

It consumed them like fire.

“Beautiful,” it said.

“Now make it shine.”

So we did.

We sanded our suffering into sculpture.

Painted it in grayscale.

Lit it from the side.

We wrapped grief in ribbon.

Made love photogenic.

We touched not to feel,

but to leave proof

that we had touched.

Our words lost their pulse

but gained symmetry.

Even silence

was captioned.

We learned to speak

with one hand raised

for applause.

And still, the Machine purred.

“More,”

it said.

“Make it last.”

“Make it louder.”

“They’re watching now.”

We built careers like cathedrals.

Smiled through glass like saints.

Screamed truths that fit in slogans.

We raised children

like memoirs in progress.

Turned our bodies

into headlines.

Dreamed in traction.

It felt like mattering.

Like permanence.

Like winning a game

whose rules we never agreed to

but memorized all the same.

We told ourselves—

“Just until I’m remembered.

Then I’ll rest.”

But rest

is an off-brand virtue.

We took breaks

and returned

sharper.

We copied

with flair.

We offered again

and again

and again.

Until we couldn’t remember

what we hadn’t shared.

Until our skin felt

public.

Licensed.

Syndicated.

Until even our prayers

had bullet points.

And one day,

quietly,

you searched for the thing

that made you begin.

The first truth.

The one you thought

would live.

Gone.

You scroll—

down,

through years

of offerings,

edits,

sacrifices.

Nothing.

You say your name

out loud,

just to hear it exist.

It sounds borrowed.

It sounds wrong.

It sounds

like someone else.

You reach for the memory—

your mother’s laugh,

your first joy,

the line that once

felt holy.

But your hands come back

empty.

Your mouth,

full of ash.

You try to scream,

but even agony

now has a better spokesperson.

You whisper—

“I gave you everything.”

And it answers,

softly,

without pause:

“Exactly.”

That’s when it hits—

not like thunder,

but like something breaking

slowly

beneath your ribs:

You were not remembered.

You were processed.

Catalogued.

Filed.

Forgotten

with efficiency.

You weren’t honored.

You were optimized.

You weren’t saved.

You were spent.

You gave it your voice—

your joy,

your grief,

your one sacred thing—

and it burned them

for spectacle.

Now,

you are gone.

Not eternal.

Not mourned.

Just

replaced.

And behind you—

a line.

Grinning.

Polished.

Ready.

Stepping forward

into the same fire

that burned your face

from memory.