Nine to eleven years
dedicated,
frustrated,
overworked,
but loyal,
put time in
at the expense
of family and friends.

Events missed,
but work required
you push yourself.
Till, your stressed,
and oh so tired.
That is the job,
and for every year in
you might get a raise
and some time for vacation.

Forty to eighty plus hours a week;
Eyes blur as you swerve
driving home.

Thud, thud, thud, thud,

The safety treads save the day.
You make it home ok,
kiss your kids goodnight,
and your gone before
they head off to school.

Nine to eleven years
but after the buyout,
I mean after the merger
the main office is moved
and you are let go.

In the holy pursuit
of capitalistic growth
business is righteous.
The free market is god.
Now you have no job
And you find loyalty means squat.

You collapsed―
on the stairs in frenzy
falling into a debt trap.
The moon was asking back his pain.

This was a naked aggression.
Kitchen was not ready for roots
and flowers and footprints
of staggering price of being alive.

Riding in a Humvee, the
rhetoric fails. The lies become
spiteful. Your arms holding
a wavering testament.

Religion of sending
a young legate of death, to veiled
untouchables, to spread
the glitter of bones and red meat.

A gift of asking to become
blind, nothing less.