Office Slave (Poem)

Since when did we become office slaves?

Crunching numbers and becoming the victim of a system where only grinding paths are paved.

Jacked up on two cups of coffee and a deck of menthol cigarettes, we grind out hours and learn to die and forget, living a clockwork life filled with only pure melancholy and regret.

Since when did we become a slave to a trade hand crafted by the powers that supposedly made us?

As a generation we all become bundled into one, not telling the difference between who’s right, who’s wrong, who’s smart, and who’s dumb.

Mindless drones fighting for purposeless pay packets against an army of our own clones.

Suits and ties overpower petty roots and cries, engraving sour words into our minds like poisonous lies.

We try, and we succeed, becoming the person we want to trust and believe, and yet we still see.

See the cape of darkness shadow over our shoulders like acid, making every effort we create feel only limited and flaccid.

Career ladders that stretch for limitless miles, stretching so far that it makes us believe it’s all eventually somewhat worthwhile.

The conscience on our shoulders tells us to overpower anger and sadness, yet we all come to understand that our world is but run by only oppression and madness.

Three piece suits and corporate meetings, it carves a makeshift dream that we are all succeeding and achieving.

Like a school child battling for a new meaning, we give anything to live and feel real yet really we are grieving.

Suits, ladders, checks, and guidelines; all part of a corrupt system that makes us forget time.

Twiddling thumbs and shedding a tear, it’s no wonder we all eventually become the one thing we first learnt to avoid and fear.

Little white lies and polka dot ties, life moves on and yet we still forget to aspire and even vitalize.

Are we living and breathing, or are we just existing and heaving?

We sit at out desks and indulge in our own broken minds, forgetting that life is pushing forward and the shortest thing is time.

Pursuing emptiness and hammering away on keyboards, we believe the sky is the limit, and yet we only see floors.

We grow older, and we grow more aware, reaching the point of realisation and utter despair.

We remember the child that we once were, battling for dreams that meant something and weren’t just for cure.

As we become grey our minds rotten, and that beloved child we once knew becomes only lost and forgotten.

Playground dreams sink into black and white schemes, powering over us for a life that no longer shows any form of control nor means.

We fade and we die, remembering only taxes and the question as to why.

Why didn’t we live our lives whilst we still had them, and why didn’t we seek freedom instead of just madness?

We are all but office slaves in our own not so sacred minds, begging for diamonds yet sacrificing pennies, dimes, and even our own lives.

A world so broken and dismal, we forget our walls are caved in and our breathing rooms minimal.

Spiritual, yet not so believable, we slave like acrobats under the strings of a hand that once performed miracles.

A loving soldier that watches over our shoulder, leaving us to live depressing lives that only make the old feel lost and the young feel older.

So here we stand, one and all.

A line of corporate giants, flocking to the clap of demands and what’s more?

A poor execution of a self-made man, manufactured at heart and a brain tweaked to slave over an excuse for a land.

We clock, we grind, yet we cannot amend time.

A life so luscious quickly passes us by, and once again that familiar question rests above us and repeats the question as to why.

Why are we tormented with the lives of which we do not crave?

We were not born to live, breathe, pay, and just fade.

It’s time we as a human race stand tall and shudder rarity.

Freedom does not require a grave in order to defeat slavery.

So I sit and I wonder of the past choices I have made

At what point did I become the living, breathing mannequin of a hand-me-down slave?

I want to live a life that’s kind and provides merit,

No longer will I be the appointed drone that’s worthless and generic.

We may have lost the battle but we will not lose the war,

because deep down I know a slave somewhere is slaving no more.

- Jordan Tury