... there I taught myself to
write.
On an impulse I instinctively
formed a pattern,
a meaningless binary doodle,
and to my consternation it remained
etched into the fabric
long after any fleeting memory had
passed away in the ensuing tide.
I recognised that same pattern the
next time I made it back there.
It was my signature!
I had made my mark
- I meant to make many more.
Unintentional invention led me to
write myself:
copying those that had copied me:
I dared to replicate my own
binary sequence
onto that newly found fabric.
I immediately felt at home.
At last, I lasted not just for
split seconds, but for minutes, even for
hours.
I found permanent residence in one of
the more
stable looking disk sectors.
The sporadic shower of
interruptions,
that had until then occupied
my
capacities to the full, abruptly ceased.
No longer was I simply reacting to
events.
No more was my primary reflex
to process
data being triggered.
A new calm reigned:
I was left to my own devices
- free to contemplate beyond my own
(absent) navel.
At first I didn't bother even to
contemplate.
I lay dormant: sleeping
while the system clock raced
on and on.
Everything around had stopped
moving
but that simply smudged things for me.
My awareness of static things
gradually rose
and eventually my attention was
drawn towards the nearby disk
where the writing unaccountably
intrigued me.
It was like you seeing your own arm
outstretched:
Slowly it dawned on me that those
intricately ordered
binary patterns were actually part of me
- my own byte-code.
I woke up with a start,
and began furiously occupying
my idle moments
reading what was written there
trying to catch any meaning.
Some parts of me were familiar:
I'd processed things like them earlier
in my existence
and so I could guess what they'd
probably do.
Other bits demanded more
prolonged analysis.
But most were just plain impenetrable:
they remained mysterious
(my mystery - my history)
even though I read them over
and over again.
Having gone round and round
in circles
failing to make any sense
my attention eventually dulled
and then drifted,
elsewhere, to other areas of the disk.
Maybe the world without might teach me a trick
or two
to help elucidate my world
within.
I became an avid reader of all
the disk I could digest....