They said if we broke the new rules
We would be sued.
We would have no backing.
And no one to blame but ourselves.
The boss tells us every year,
Before he jets off with his family for the month,
That we are the beating heart of the school.
He laments that there is no money for raises.
We’re supposed to do what we do
For passion and praise. It’s uncouth
For any of us to expect to be paid
For training the next generation of troops.
When Paul’s heart failed,
And they cleaned out his office,
They were glad to be rid of
His grandfathered retirement pay.
We’re a family, they say;
The kind with a narcissistic grandmother.
We’re all helping her maintain the belief:
We would be nothing without her.
labor
Errata 003 (The Guillotine)
Every textbook read
Teaches us to take pride in your graft
Live for you and we can eat
And hope a few survive as children
They'll endure by tooth and claw
The world is yours, the anthem sings
Said bring you the bread
Clock in clock out pray to the calf
It's dishonorable to cheat
My blood becomes your billions
Your bloody hands stain every vault
All is yours but we have dreams
But guess what we got you instead
Don't bother dodging simple math
All for one was bare deceit
There's one of you, but we are millions
The blade is clean, and sharp, and broad
We'll only keep a headless king.
Gimme A Dollar
I found, as expected, a card in my mailbox.
Sealed with a sticker
Embossed: “Happy Birthday”
I wondered if there was a gift card inside for a bloomin’ onion
(There wasn’t)
Let me fish it from the trash–I don’t remember what it said–
“We hope that your birthday was as amazing as you are”
It’s management dogma:
Never give a worker anything useful
Wages are kept low
So we are kept weak
I wonder what a birthday card costs–I never buy them–
Everything costs twice as much as it did yesterday
(Except labor).
Signed with love, from my [redacted] family.
My [redacted] family,
Who’d just turned my brothers and sisters
Out in the cold
I suppose I should be grateful
For the chance
To feast on their flesh
My parents took me out to eat for my birthday and gave me a hundred dollars.
They spent time with me and we talked about the world.
They know I don’t want a card, though I’ll still check it
For cash before tossing it in the garbage.
How wonderful it would be to come to work on my birthday
And find a crisp one dollar bill
With love,
From my family.
Sophistry and Solipsism in the New Millennium 