I finished another novel last week, the second this year. I have a non-fiction book on A Clockwork Orange to complete editing before the month is over. In the brief interim between these tasks, a little poem of my own emerged, not for once a (mis)translation.
I don’t personally know what to make of it really, except that it came very quickly and almost complete, requiring only the careful editing eye of a poet friend to identify the couple of lines which needed tweaking. So, I tweaked, and here we are.
Make of it what you will. Normal service, such as it is, will be resumed in a bit.
The Reset Button
It’s an insult really, isn’t it, life
on the easy setting, thrown about
like privilege, a cut of envy. No,
life’s not fair and never will be. Is it
even possible to discern
the wailing at the hated mirror or
the late-night puking in the eyes
of the most-liked, the prettiest girl?
Money doesn’t mean you don’t have
problems. You just don’t have money
problems. Instead you struggle
with how others don’t have any and
how you think they’d like yours. Or
so I’m told through shiny embarrassed teeth
by people who have never loaned me any.
Every day, every single day, thousands
of men cross forests and deserts, sailing in
frail flotillas on oceans of desperate envy, to these
promised lands. What is this odyssey of hope?
What quest for equity? What fight? What end?
We’ll be equal when we’re dead and not before.