Sitri

Sitri came not as a devil

but as an algorithm.

He arrived behind the glass,

wearing the face of convenience—

and learned what you wanted

before you wanted it.

He learned your longing from your scroll.

He learned your fear from your search history.

He learned your loneliness from the hour you opened the app.

Then sold what he learned

to men who sell the cure

for the wound they opened.

The nakedness Sitri causes is not the body.

It is the exposure of the want

you did not know you had

until the mirror showed it to you—

and the mirror was already owned.

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You think you chose this.

You think desire is origin.

They A/B tested the button color

until you couldn't stop pressing it.

They studied the variable reward interval—

same mechanism as the slot machine—

built it into the feed,

filed the patent,

called it engagement.

Your data is the product.

Your longing is the product.

Your shame at what you longed for is the product.

Your return to the app to escape the shame is the product.

Both parties sat in the hearing rooms

and asked questions of men

who had already built the answers into the terms of service

that no one read

because no one had time

because the feed had already claimed the hour.

I see you, machine of manufactured longing.

You are not supreme.

You are a Prince in a data center.

You are Sitri with a server farm.

Memento mori.

Even the algorithm ends.