My core is strong
And I stand on this long line of misinformed consumers
Buying into the waste that we allow to control us
Forced to vote between the lesser of two evils
As if voting for evil in any form
is better than choosing God
Well I choose God, in complex simplicity
We are blessed with the option of
Sweating to raise vegetation from dust
Warmed in the sun and soaked in wisdom's wetness
Drenched by His design and turned into
Two parts hydrogen and one part oxygen
By our overly complicated thirst for knowledge and control
So that a land abundant with the seeds for growth
Can leave so many starving.
I am afraid.

Life's Clock

You spit on me. Right on my forehead. While talking to me. You just spit on my forehead and then turned around and walked away, your high water khaki pants wedged tightly between your butt cheeks. It's probaly the braces you wear, I think to myself as I pick up my torture steak and follow after you to the back of the lane to mop up the spilled ketchup on aisle five.

"You can take out the trash and refill the candy display," you tell me through the silver cage imprisoning your teeth surrounded by miniature volcanic eruptions peppering your face like a third grade science project. "I don't care that there are rats back there, you have to take the trash bag all the way to the back of the trash room," you say with annoyance. I sigh and invision the clock. Even in my day dreams it has stopped. You do an army style about face and without even turning to look at me belch out "you have customers."

My day is spent rushing about a seven by seven foot space filled with cigarettes and candy. Hours of service melt into a collage of thoughts, a steady drumbeat of climatic highs and lows until you reemerge from the shit hole that you refer to as your office to offer criticism on the simplicity of refilling the coffee cups when they are low.

For a moment, this is my reality. Just a moment. This is an hour, a blink of God's eye. A distant memory, that I can recall at leisure. And with this recollection, I see my reflection in your retina. A beautiful, young, Black college student exploding with potential. Gracefully pushing a mop, elongated torso reaching for the pack of condoms and fitting that stupid uniform in ways you didn't know possible. Laughing with patrons and seeing a future beyond the parking lot. Rushing toward opportunity at the end of the day. Smiling bright with the security of knowing that I have the power to start the first day of the rest of my life at any given moment. I would hate me too, if I were you. I am already that person. Looking at you, yet looking past you as I drop a dollar into your tip jar and you smile weakly wondering what I do for a living. Wondering where I go when the door drifts shut behind me and clicks into place locking you in. Wondering why the gods smiled on me, forgetting the hour that I put in on life's clock. But I remember.