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Postmodern Middle Class
17:26
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I am the postmodern middle class.
Poetry comes out my ass--
what are my words but passengers?
(shouldn't they be messengers?)
but god, I'm only messing here
with things others created.
Was it fated?
No, brother, I fake it.
I've got no right to talk at all.
I've got no nighttime life at all.
Grew up in a middle class neighbourhood,
food on the table, and life was good:
hockey on the street,
love in the home,
shoes on our feet,
real talk--no phoney shit, no.
Can't I complain, though?
I've got no right to talk at all.
I am the postmodern middle class.
Decency shoved up my ass.
What are we but passengers?
Please don't shoot the messenger,
but god, the only mess in here
is one that I created.
Was I fated?
No, brother, I made it up.
I don't go to church 'cause I'm my own person;
I leave all my friends 'cause I don't deserve them;
I don't go to school 'cause what the hell's learning
if I have to spend the next ten years earning
the money to pay for
some lame piece of paper
I'll never even use,
but got because you told me to.
Good lord I am so alone.
What have I got to show for this?
A bike's too good to chauffeur this
lame ass bag of bones.
Can't I complain, though?
I've got no right to talk at all.
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Smells like cow shit
and hot pavement on the streets.
I'm tired of bullshit--
I'm not giving in to weaknesses,
but brother,
I'm tired, I'm broken,
I'm feeling no hope and
I think I just might
give up.
I've never spent a summer
outside my parents' basement,
where it's cool all the time
whereas now I have to face it--
and I just can't sleep.
The heat is keeping me awake at night,
and I can't face it right,
can't take it right
now, make it.
'Cause brother,
I'm tired, I'm broken,
I'm feeling no hope and
I think I just might
give up.
And there's this heaviness,
and I feel it in my bones.
There's a hell in this--
a god in this?--
temple of my flesh that sits
too heavy to sustain.
And it gives me
pain to admit
that I can't really feel it--
day to day,
goes away,
comes again,
goes away,
comes again,
and it just ain't pain.
Just a heaviness.
At the end of this,
will I get any better?
Will I understand why
I never got any better?
Good god, why am I here
in the first place--
this is the worst place I could imagine.
This ain't the worst place--
I should be laughing.
I'm just a lame ass
middle class
white kid with issues.
("Should you go to the doctor?
Should I get you some tissues?")
No, brother--my issues are fictitious.
My healing is improbable,
my problems are unsolvable
because they don't exist at all.
Oh brother.
What am I?
These are a stencil of a problem.
Imaginary numbers--you can't solve them.
My sins, you can't absolve them.
My issues you can't take
upon your back (they're make
believe, brother, they're fake).
I still feel them though.
Only, brother,
I'm tired, I'm broken,
I'm feeling no hope and
I think I just might
give up.
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I'm so depressed I'm writing text posts on tumblr,
fitting in with all the sex, GIFs, and hunger.
I didn't tell my mom
(it isn't personal)--
it's just they get me here,
they understand it all.
Walking home in the rain,
once again I've missed the train
(#me #personal).
Taking a piss
(#urinal).
Want to know how I've been?
Follow my blog, I've queued my sins.
Want to know my deepest secret?
Under the read-more's where I keep it
(#me #personal).
Drinking wine
(#merlot),
with a grainy ass picture
of a wine glass and my sister.
For more notes, tagged it "girl,"
I'm the ruler of this world.
I'm still tired, though.
I don't get out much.
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In the morning: moaning, sore, out of breath,
fading specters of sleep--feeling tired as death.
What did I dream of?
In the dead of the night,
in the breadth without light,
what did I dream of?
I dreamed of everything and nothing
(everything is nothing in my sleep,
at least that's how everything seems
when chasing after fading dreams).
In the dark behind my eyelids,
in the lies I hide in darkness, rises
memories of dreams.
I dreamed of car crashes; casseroles;
Gandalf; and guacamole, chips, and salsa
forming battle lines in front of me.
I dreamed of living in anemones--
oh wait, that's Finding Nemo.
Don't you see, though?
I dreamed of everything and nothing.
On the TV she says follow your dreams.
What the hell does that mean?
How do we measure success?
Is it measured in sex?
Is it measured in money,
career, or units of family?
If it is I have failed indeed--
I've done nothing good, you see:
I've loved no Eurydice,
fought no Thermopylae,
climbed up no Pyrenees,
trained like no Hercules,
I have lived uselessly.
God, are you kidding me--
follow your dreams?
I have none.
No, wait,
I have one.
I want to sleep without dreams,
I want to be without dreams,
I want to wake without dreams
that make everything seem
like a shadowy sheen
has been dropped on all things.
I want to sleep without dreams
and still
be.
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My feet hurt from walking to work
where I get paid a cent over minimum wage;
and my back aches from sleeping poorly
on a bed where I wake sorely in the middle to late morning.
At work (shitty customer service),
always wondering whether the money's really worth it,
and it's fustrating, fustrating,
take the "R" out of words and it's
frustrating, frustrating.
Take the heart out of words and it's customer service:
repeating endlessly the same five phrases;
they all blur together, the same five faces;
work another five hours? I don't think I can face it.
And my feet hurt, walking home from work,
where I strip down, fall down, tumblr, and TV--
almost comatose, you can't say that I'm needy.
As a matter of fact, I've hardly been eating
(my sister says that I should be feeding,
but I can't afford it--my bank account's bleeding).
I hate my job but I sure as hell need it
for the punk-ass hipster band Ts;
I need that box set of DVDs
(who am I kidding, I need the Blu-rays);
and that new XBOX system video game;
I need a 12-pack of beer, but don't worry mom,
I'll get the cheap one.
And if I don't make rent,
I have a rich friend online
who can wire me cash just fine.
At least I'm pretty sure
(I've never asked him before).
I'm pretty confident
that I'll make rent anyway
(I'll have the money any day now)--
so what do you say?
I'll renew my WoW subscription
and my medical prescription
for those ADD drugs that you said that I needed
when I was failing in school.
That's cool, right?
I'll be fine?
I just need more time.
Maybe in a thousand years of lead insides
and heavy limbs and deadened eyes
you'll wake up and want to do shit;
or wake up and want to nuke it;
but brother, you've got time.
Time to get better or time to get worse;
time is a blessing and time is a curse;
and brother, you've got it.
Maybe time will sit like a ten tonne brick
on your back and crack your spine,
or maybe you'll be fine,
but brother, you've got time.
Maybe time will drag like a parachute bag,
will lag like a flagging horse;
maybe time will fly by sky high, parachute-less,
and drag you to death much quicker than you'd like;
maybe time will sigh as it passes by;
but whether or not you care
whether time is here or there
it will always come and go,
it will always be near.
And maybe in a year (though it'll feel like longer)
you will wake up feeling rested, you will wake up feeling stronger,
and you'll jump upon its back as it travels to the future--
but who am I kidding.
I'm just bullshitting.
Time will always be a villain, it will always laugh at you,
as you struggle every minute, bleeding every second,
to keep your head, in sanity, away from time's insanity--
it's mocking, swearing, laughing, jawing, calling you to
truly answer tormenting with slave labour.
Working later. Sleeping poorer.
Time belabours, never favours anyone.
But you've got it.
Brother, you've got time.
Maybe in a thousand years of lead insides
and heavy limbs and deadened eyes,
time will call me home, apologize.
Maybe.
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