We’ve taken the string between our hands,
Drawn it tight, hoping it would sing,
Instead it snapped, with a ringing scream,
Maybe we shouldn’t have twisted it up,
Each little knot scarring it,
We cried, “Complexity,”
Before it was so straight and narrow,
How boring the little string was,
It wasn’t even dyed,
It was pure natural cotton,
We cried, “Colour,”
But we covered it with our soot,
Our greasy hands defiled it,
Poor little string,
We never said we’re sorry,
After all, it was entirely your fault.

We climb the ropes and ladders to success,
Jumping from rung to rung,
assuring our social status.
But the wood is slick and so often we fall.
The bars drop and
we are caught by material things.
We are trapped,
restrained from our normal snooping.
The community drives the wedge home,
and individuals are born.
Next envy sprouts and
slowly twists up the body.
We are left boxed in,
restricted,
yet seemingly
empty and
unfulfilled.

The flies gather on the window,
They’re holding a meeting,
And I know they’re talking about me,
I crunch them individually,
It’s personal.
But afterwards I just stare out the window,
Watching the horrible lights flicker,
Those lights have trapped me,
Like they trap the flies,
I know they’re false,
On rainy days the flies don’t visit,
And I cry because I miss them.