they put us all out (a poem)

Friday, March 14, 2025

Disintegration, Dissolution
Let’s get rich quicker—
watch me squeeze what’s left from the citizenry.

The life leaves, the lights fade from their eyes,
we’re left holding the bag
while they fly off to their private islands,
shack up in the bunker, ride it out.

I’m still shining—
it only cost 360 million.
Individual units, all defrauded,
standing in line for some peanuts.

Do a few tricks—
are you not entertained?

Replace the humans,
I like the computer version better.
Plus, Human Resources? So messy.

Better just to crack the server whip,
make the bots twitch back to life,
pay the electricity and move on,
while the oil in our lamp runs out.

Watch the spark, the dream,
collapse into anger, hurt, betrayed,
all trying to afford what they call a home.

Snuffed, stamped wick
with wet providential fingers—
just like that, a pinch,
and they put us all out, outmoded,
with the push of the updates, overnight,
while we were sleeping, collapsed with emails.

What house of cheap cards,
and what they said we could live in,
infrastructure imploded,
and nothing changing.