The Machine That Is

China.

I’ve been caught up in the grinding cogs of a gargantuan factory. I hear only sounds, but no words. I met more people in secluded, sealed Myanmar who spoke English than here. China grinds and galumphs with churning, burning, spewing sounds crashing through the gridded cityscapes. There is no setting between off and max with voices, no inflection, only screaming, screeching, tearing words that thunder across you with rhythmic stride. Trains, and smog, and snow pulling, sinking, crushing on the same beat as the cars that push and pulse down the street.
There are no names, only ID tags with bold numbers pinned to the chest of every employee. As if each person were but a piece installed into the great red beast; labeled teeth gnashing in a yawing iron maw. Every where there are sparks faltering in the bitter cold as steel grates on stone.

A woman came up to me selling maps on the street. Fear flooded her eyes and she dropped the maps and spun off from me as a pod of men (all alike in height and breadth) strode past with equal stride and grabbed her. They didn’t struggle or hassle her, they didn’t even break pace, they just kept moving as they latched on and propelled her down the shifting corridor. People every where churned on unaware. They tugged her, pulled her, plied her onwards, down a cluttered shaft of an ally and beat her. The wall of figures shifted and the scene was swallowed.

I swirl alone on the crimson streets seeking some glimmer of warmth. I find scorpions on sticks freshly roasted; some brittle and poisoned heat to gnash between my chaffing lips. Wandering North I find a wall that never stopped anyone… except tourists. It’s pretty great, but also frigid, frigid and mechanical.

At every check point there is a scanner that reads your sore temperature. They are scanning feverishly for those with any thermal anomalies. The dark blue uniforms with silver number plates are seeking dieses, and stopping in their route those who are burning too bright.

Everywhere there is movement. Everywhere there is pulsing, throbbing, grinding, thumping, stuttering, shaking, pounding, silence.

China.