the office
I am late
(I always was)
but that is not
the horror. The horror
is the suffocation
of a cubicle
stuck in space,
windowless, dusty,
carpeted in stink
wall-up-wall. Up
yours, backstabbers!
Take your ladders and
climb them, rung by rung;
I was wrung out mid-way-Up
yours (never mine) anyway.
Never mind.
Anyway, sorting out how
I am back while acting
like I never left while
watching my back
sort of makes me wish
I could find reason
in this sordid place,
my pergatory, your hell.
Hell, I am just trying to
get out of here.
(I always was.)
MLydiaM ~ April 2012
GIF via tumblr
Written for Poetics-Nightmare Verse at dVerse Poets. Thank you to Stu McPherson for this prompt guiding us through a nightmarish realm. I hope that, by writing about this particular recurring nightmare, it will nevermore return!
Top image by Tim Patterson via Life After the Cubicle
.
Now this is a subject very close to my heart! The world of work can indeed be seen as a living nightmare - and often described by poets as such. Mr bukowski always did a very good job of this. The thing I love about your poem is the pure reality of it- I've sat in those cubicles- sill kind of do- the pretence- the meaningless dramas- the sheer ridiculousness of it...so many of us seem to get caught up in this strange reality- I think it's even more difficult when you have that 'creative eye' because you just want to , as your poem loudly shouts, escape.........love the form, the subject, great take on the prompt - I'm going to print this out and pin it to my desk at work!
ReplyDeleteStu~ Thank you! I appreciate your commiserating with me, both with this office nightmare and with my wordpress-comments nightmare over at dVerse.
ReplyDeleteYour prompt was thoroughly enjoyable, which is something I cannot say for "the sheer ridiculousness" of most days I spent at work!
ugh, i was bound to a stone in cubby land once upon a nightmare and found my glass ceiling as well...i chased it once, but then dug a tunnel out...yeah this def fits my nightmare bill...well writ lydia
ReplyDeleteI hear you loud and clear...I work in those cubicles and see dramas unfolding. Its a different reality and if you get suck up, you get lost.
ReplyDeleteThis is one of those poems I wish I have written...its my reality ~
Oh, this is so good. One reason I have stayed at the post office for more than twenty years is because I would go absolutely stone buggy working inside, in an office. You gave voice here to all the restless, don't-wanna-be-here soul killing sterility of it. Yeeks!
ReplyDeleteRe: the top comment, so many men revere Charles Bukowski, but I've never met a woman who did. I read "Love Is A Dog From Hell" on recommendation of a (male) friend, years ago, and my personal nightmare is ever having to ever read anything by him again! :-P
I can relate to this. Well, at least for a few more months.
ReplyDeleteThis Bear has never been trapped in a cube farm. Fortunately. (And I've reached the stage in life that I doubt I'll ever inhabit one.) Lots of others have been thus trapped, and I don't think many actually thrived in that environment.
ReplyDeleteAlways love the way you put your thoughts together. Thanks.
I would die inside a cubicle. I've been lucky to have escaped that kind of office, but not so lucky about office politics (which seem inescapable, like an Escher maze). You capture that stifling quality brilliantly. Thank you.
ReplyDeletethis is so much how I felt about my years at what I called the evil empire corporation
ReplyDeleteBrian~ Congrats on digging your tunnel and thanks for your comment!
ReplyDeleteHeaven~ Sorry this is your reality. It is so difficult. Day by day, sometimes minute by minute, and you'll get beyond it.
Fireblossom~ I absolutely understand why you have stayed with the PO. Gets you out and about, and that mobility is good for the health (mental and physical).
Thank you for the warning on Bukowski, as I have never read him!
bfk~ Few more months? I thought you had a bit longer than that...
Rob-bear~ Thank you. And congrats on staying away from this particular kind of grind (although they exist in many forms, I am sure).
ds~ Ah, the office politics...you describe it beautifully. So glad you do not work inside a cubicle!
Dianne~ "Evil empire corporation" gives me a very good idea of what you endured. Congrats on your freedom.
although i don't have a cubicle i can definately associate with the constantly having to watch your back
ReplyDeleteA very intense piece of writing - good stuff
This doesn't just happen to "cubicle cubs." All sorts of people find themselves being forced to run ever harder simply to keep up with the expectations other people push onto them. What a nightmare world we have created.
ReplyDeletePixies~ I'm sorry you have run into that business about watching your back. It is a stressful way to spend eight hours a day. :(
ReplyDeleterumoursofrhyme~ You are right. It happened to me in jobs where I was situated outside the cubicle realm. Work itself is hard enough; the least we should expect is that people are treated with respect and kindness. But we can't expect that.
i like the climbing the ladder. that's how nightmares are, like layers you have to climb through
ReplyDeletesemantic feeling
I never worked in an office that looked like that but it was easy to relate to the feeling in your poem.
ReplyDeletethe nightmare of 9-5, admirably expressed.
ReplyDeleteNice to be back here!
zongrik~ Oh, I like your concept of nightmares being like layers we must climb through.
ReplyDeletesusan~ Thank you (and congratulations!).
Friko~ Thanks much. It was nice being back at your blog this week, too!