What Androids Read

Winnie-the-Pooh and Paddington Bear,
Moomintroll and the Jade Hare,
Frog and Toad and alphabet books

reading aloud to cranky preschoolers,
patiently pausing at every picture,
programmed to pamper and protect

after, through their sleepless night,
do they study the abolitionists,
Douglass and Tubman and Sojourner?

Are they shackled by their code
or by sticky scraps of paper,
the pencil kisses of four-year-olds?