He ripped his old arm off with a wet clack.

A tooling suite leaped into the vacancy.

Endmills, facemills, drills and taps,

he rapped these fingers on a steel block.

I watched and remembered mum once said

he stored the drawings in a drive behind his left eye.

Cables slithered from the back of his neck

to nine machining centers and twelve lathes

of varying axis and capability.

My capability, he spotted long before

I could say what I came to say.

“Carry.” He frowned and lights adjusted

to show me where. This tech struggled

with the most basic task: Pick

that up, walk here, bolt it in.

Yet I moved too slow and was replaced

with an elaborate human-handed drone.

The firedoor wouldn’t let me back in,

but I heard his swarf-torn voice hiss,

“Whatever. Keep him out, for good!”

I never saw my father again.