Digital Immigrants

A new immigrant now comes: I see him on our streets, I see him on the factory floor, I see him at an old friend's desk-- How I would that there he would stop! But robots they are: neither modesty nor empathy they know. He doesn't look like us And won't speak our language; Our culture he regards as sickness or weakness; Fun he scorns and labors all day And so is a favorite of the lords and gods That make and own the business world. Against him closed borders are no defense, And from him scarce a job is secure-- Except, of course, in politics and poetry. From those worlds our solace will come-- The muscle of vision and that of words By which one day to claw back our world. It's best, though, that it never comes to this: If robots truly have come of age Their father's house they should leave alone And their own go build on faraway Mars. Be they warned that "the meek shall inherit the earth" And that meekness ever is on our side