I
I'm no grumbler, make no bones about the hour
II
but this ticker on my wrist
is a chain around my neck
III
chemically, I am so wound up
constantly held awake by trebled tick
by double-bass tock
IV
Bollocks to this eternal present
straight from one job to another
better to get it right twice a day
than right for all time
V
hurtling around
this place all-day
I've been watching this old oak grow
even that fucking hunk of wood
has more to show than me
VI
VII
it's not like anyone
is pleased to see me
I'm the fleeting second,
a hole between the minutes,
conductor of an hour's malaise
how long do I have left
how late I am
how soon is now
VIII
720 deliveries dawn to dusk
each climb ends in descent
and each drop in a climb
not one can be late
free and lanced to the spot
time for myself in the evenings?
I can hardly lift my arms
with the weight of the day
IX
I've been told to try church
but all those bells and wheels,
doesn't it freak you out - that we might
go on forever? that this end might
have no end?
God is a manager
docking your pay
for each passing moment
you spend away
X
I reckon I'm losing it,
this each day being the same as last.
Out on the rounds,
you ever see yourself
passing yourself?
my sense of déjà vu
is wild, millions of me
cascading back and back
held fast at each moment
each step locked under glass
XI
my mind grates on me, I'm told
you have too much going on. Try
finding release in the present
they don't know the half of it
If I slow down for myself
they would slow too
and if I were to stop...
doesn't bare thinking.
life in the gig economy
a contract we enter into
unknowingly
XII
believe me, no time
to search for other work,
there's no escape
no stepping outside of yourself
to get the measure of your metre
I tried it once, they knocked in
my bloody noggin
said I was kaput, finished, done.
coward that I am,
that maybe we are
all end up
dancing to their tune
