On his day off,
He gets a call to
Come in to work though
He was just there
Seven hours ago.
Last week he was
On his way to start
His shift and they told him
It was too slow,
Go back home.
Jobs are few and
Far between here,
There are mouths
To be fed and
Dreams to put on hold.
It’s not only the
Disturbing lack of
Empathy permeating
Their actions, but
Also how uniformly
They’ve become
Radicalized,
Common decency,
Social conscience,
Quaint terms to be
Maligned, abandoned
In favor of abject
Heartlessness.
The difference lies
In that they only care
About absolute power.
Collaboration
Doesn’t matter, only
Total domination,
A primal compulsion
To be in control to
Somehow make up for
Feelings of instability
Deep within, not a
Moment’s thought for
Anything other than
Immediate cravings.
He’s unable to
See the world
From someone else’s
Perspective, an
Unimaginable
Shortcoming
For someone who
Is in charge of
Caring for others.
She works full-time
For a large
Restaurant chain and
Still doesn’t make
Enough money to pay for
A dental appointment
Which, of course, isn’t
Something her employer
Offers as a benefit,
It being far more important
To make sure those at
The top are taken care of.
The difficulty involved
In letting go of anger,
Something that has
Supposedly served him
For so many years but has,
In actuality,
Only steered him away
From what really matters,
A lesson learned after
Too many years of failure.
Under flimsy guise of
Choice and freedom,
Cavalierly dismantling
Vital programs offering
The less fortunate a
Chance to live a life of
Dignity, perhaps to
Succeed one day.
Turning the clock back to
A darker time when
The many had to fend
For themselves,
At the mercy of
So-called captains,
Two-bit pirates
Raiding the coffers.
He encounters a problem
And calls customer service.
Not again, a voice with
An accent on the other end.
He rages about the
Person trying to help him but not
About the company outsourcing jobs,
Paying some hapless human being
A quarter of what they
Would pay someone in
This country just to
Make a few people
That much richer.
Hardness forged by
Ferocious words,
Closed fists,
Absence of kindness,
Scarcity.
Hypervigilance,
Fearsome monsters around
Every corner,
Innocence exterminated,
Leaving nothing but
Raw hatred,
Lovelessness.
