SHAPING UP

Sedating my state
I settle down
onto a lower plateau
I will feed you
I will feed you
on your own experience
to fend off alienation
doubt me not for what I appear to be
I'm regurgitating
I'm recycling
I'm refining
the techniques of masturbation
I'm molesting my inner child
this is a collect call from my future self
we have found slower ways to kill ourselves
with wrench hands and screwdriver legs
porceline hearts replaced by latex bladders
the gods have become incorporated
demanding our will be bent in service
we must sacrifice our dreams
for each new day's convenience
so when do we need the shade
any more than now
and how do we stop
a machine that mutates like a virus
I smolder now
in my waiting
anticipating
a new day
a new way
to define the obvious
a new way
to shape the void
now it looks like
a blob of nothing
now it looks like
something
that is broken
now it looks like
all that I am lacking
now it looks like
mother's worst nightmare
now it looks like
we have found ourselves
a temporal zone of mild comfort

- Scott Tuomala, 1995