Specious conversation
Of day in and day out
The lives of many
Concerned with who did what
How he or she
Said this or that

He was
45
She was 19
She did not know
He had two other
Lady loves

Nor, that he was 260 pounds
And balding, gray haired
Barely able to walk a mile
She loved him for his kindness
He loved her for her hips
And her *******

As did he love the others
For their buxom figures
Alas, he did not love himself
And thus he hid from them
His fatal flaws
Behind a screen

Joking of how stress
Is more potent than
His addiction
To the nicotine
That blackened his lungs
And bragging to a young man
Far more genuine
Just as he wished he was

She was 36
She looked 50
She worked two jobs
At 10 an hour
To support her fleeting family
Wishing she was struggling
A bit more with finance

Wishing her son was not taken
By the grasp of a depressant drug
Injected in the veins
Ten too many times

As did she wish
She could abscond from the local crimes
And live in luxury
Not far away, but in a safer place

So, I told her
Of my story of success
And how my brother
Had lived through
What her son had not survived
I had no words to comfort her

They were each 17
Constricted from individuality
By the strong grip of capitalism

They spoke in envy
Of how an older coworker
Was brazen enough to be accepted
For his long hair, and baggy jeans
Paid more, not for his drive and resolve
But his familiarity


I did not respect them
Until I came to understand
They only wished to be like me
Untied from the system
Outlandishly myself

I thought, "How tiny minds might think,
In vapid ways
To cope with the meaninglessness
Of their existence."

Not now, though
I see the truth
They move through their lives
Step by step, one foot ahead of the other
Working toward what I have taken for granted

He asked me for a cigarette
Offering his last seventy two cents

I gave it freely
Not to **** him more quickly
But to quell his demons
So he could live another day
Believing in the world
Which crippled him

I have come to understand
that insignificant, trivial things
hold importance in numbers.

Most people live
to be a part of something greater,
but in recognizing the bigger picture,
I have failed to see the purpose
of smaller things until now.
I never sought to belong.
I never wished to contribute
to arbitrary, mechanical actions.

However, I know now
that to become greater,
I must find something worth being small for.

In order to be what my identity stipulates,
first I have to achieve the stature
to exceed my shadow,
so that I might stand tall and bask in the brightness.