Corporate Death - by Teddy Nutmeg

Here's another rant against corporate America from Teddy Nutmeg circa 2002. This one comes in the form of a poem. How creative. (It actually is, we just prefer to be sarcastic than profess our true admiration for Teddy and his writing. It's how we hide our true feelings. Because we are shy. Sort of. Enough! Stop reading this and read a good writer (Teddy)! -KV

Corporate Death
Teddy Nutmeg

Vulgarities crouch anxiously on the tip of my tongue
As the boss tells me how it is.
"Fuck this fuckin bullshit!!"
I want to scream out, shove it in his face,
You don't own me motherfucker!!
But instead, "I realize that, and I'll do what I have to do."
Corporate newspeak, hard and fast, pours through
My intentions like water through a sieve.
Have I become a mouthpiece through which false positivity, plastic happiness and greed spout like slogans from a presidential candidate?

This place, this mindset, tempting, a permeating and permanent cloud thick as
Cuban cigar smoke-once it seeps into you there's no cleansing,
No leaving, no going back to poverty and happiness.
You're going to reek (of money) forever.

Hands and feet and my iron (hah!) will are chained, lashed down, on task,
No room in the brain for thoughts-
home, mom and dad aging faster than week-old milk,
Little sister's not little anymore, did she graduate from college yet?
Brother, what's important in your life now?
Grandma, I miss your sweetness and eternal unwavering love. How long can you hold on?

Until Christmas I hope,
because I'm too busy to go home more than twice (once) a year.

No room in the soul for soul-
All desires, all hopes, all dreams, all loves now surrendered to greed.
No room anymore for expression, tolerance, spontaneity or lightness.
All those things can't fit into a shiny new Porsche 911 (new metaphor for life)
Barely room for your always-packed bags and trophy girlfriend,
Who comes second to your business trips and golf game, of course.

I am corporate.
I am dead.

-Teddy Nutmeg