The Ballad of the Box-Ticker

“And still they tick’d, and still they grew,
Though none could tell what they would do.”

---

In towers tall of glass and glare,
Where numbers hum through filtered air,
There reigns a brood both pale and sly—
Who measure stars, but never sky.
They tick their boxes, humbly proud,
Each whisper lost within the crowd;
And from their screens, like oracles dim,
They conjure worth from metrics grim.

---

The craftsman’s hand, the thinker’s art,
Are costed, logged, and torn apart;
The plumber scorned, the teacher scolded—
While spreadsheets bloom, in columns folded.
And still they rise, the clerks of mist,
Each data-cell a catechist;
Their creed: “To measure is to know—
Though knowing, none may profit so.”

---

The call-man’s toil, the worker’s hour,
Are priced and filed by unseen power;
Yet none shall mark, nor dare to name,
The counter who records the same.
They grow, these watchers of the deed,
Like ivy on a dying seed;
And what was once alive with use,
Now feeds the bureaucratic muse.

---

O Muse! Thou ghost of reason cold,
Whose gospel counts what hearts once told—
Thy priests are legioned, solemn, sure,
Their gospel neat, their faith obscure.
Each morning brings a chart, a graph,
To trace the firm’s declining laugh;
And still they smile, with earnest cheer—
“The numbers rise! All’s well this year!”

---

But lo! the city groans beneath,
A London choked by rent and wreath;
Where youth must sell both time and soul,
To reach an office, not a goal.
And still the lords of HR say,
“Tick twice before thou end the day!”
For rules must swell, and forms must flow,
That none may reap the seeds they sow.

---

Then spake the sage with glinting eye,
“The cure lies not in how, but why.”
Let labor breathe, let mind explore,
The worth uncounted, evermore.
For work’s not found in measured parts,
But in the grand design of hearts—
And if thou’dst save thy soul from loss,
Cast down thy box, and break thy cross.

---

Moral:

To optimize the part is vain,
The whole must sing, or none shall gain.

The Mariner’s curse is ours to bear—
We count the wind, but not the air.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mu54ERQZZIw&t=14s 

The Pope and the Ice

The Pope stood high with hat so white,
He blessed the crowd from left to right.
He raised his hand (so very nice),
And said out loud, “I now bless ice!”

“Oh bless the ice!” the people cried.
But what he meant—well, none could decide.
Did he mean cubes? So cold! So clear!
Or agents folks might slightly fear?

Reporters yelled, “The Pope loves ICE!”
“Enforcement work is holy, nice!”
While nuns said, “No, it’s water’s freeze!
He’s blessing drinks and snowy seas!”

Priests were puzzled, monks perplexed,
Theologians deeply vexed.
“Does ice have souls? Or legal fees?
Can cubes confess on bended knees?”

The kitchens buzzed with holy glee,
They blessed their trays religiously.
The freezers hummed, the cold air flowed,
The holy frost just softly glowed.

Then ICE (the group!) sent out a tweet:
“The Vatican thinks we’re rather neat!”
The Pope just sighed, “Oh mercy me,
That’s not the ice I meant, you see!”

“But maybe,” smiled the Pope with grace,
“A little warmth could bless this place.
If hearts can melt, and tempers cool—
Then bless all ice! That’s my one rule.”

So if you sip or serve or serve the law,
Remember what the crowd once saw:
A Pope, a pun, a crowd enticed—
Forever blessed the world with… ice. 

Peanut Butter Saturdays

There's a hum in the wall and a buzz in the sky,
And the Wi-Fi's whispering, "We're watching you, guy."
The toaster's a traitor, the lamp's got a plan,
And the fridge is in league with the government van.

The peanut butter's poisoned, the butter's a lie,
And even your toothbrush is spying—oh my!
The football is evil, the films are all fake,
And joy is a donut they'll never let you bake.

But once, on a Saturday, golden and free,
My brother and I made toast, just he and me.
We'd slather on butter (don't skip it, you clown!),
Then peanut butter thickly, all gooey and brown.

No allergies, warnings, or labels in red,
Just laughter and crumbs and the smell of warm bread.
The world didn't buzz with invisible fear,
And no one was tracking our breakfast that year.

Now screens flicker poison, and voices all shout,
And I just want one morning where joy isn't doubt.
So I curse at the world with its secrets and spies—
And dream of that toast, and my brother's small eyes.

Maybe the butter's still waiting, who knows?
For the kid with a knife and a nose full of toast.

Black Paintings

In the lugubrious hush of evening’s breath,
Where shadow gleams upon the plastered wall,
I wander through a gallery of death,
Whispers of madness in each sombre hall.

No gentle light dares trespass here or stay;
The pigments bleed with anguish—black, untrue,
As if the night itself had found its way
To sear the soul, unmask the tortured view.

Behold the Titan, ravenous with dread,
His limbs convulsed in Saturn’s fiendish maw—
He rends the flesh, devours the hope once bled,
And laughs through carnage what the fates foresaw.

There, crones lean over broth of silent fear,
Old eyes as hollow as a skull’s caved dome;
Their goblet holds the bitter cup of years,
No mercy flows in that deteriorate home.

Across the gloom, two figures fight with rods,
Each stroke a hymn to ruin, mud and shame;
Their forms half sunk in horrors, unknown gods
Smiling as they dance in fury’s name.

A swordless Judith, torch’s flicker dim,
Stands poised in shadows, both avenger and prey;
Her victim lies beyond our mortal rim,
His head dissolved in night’s eternal gray.

In corridors where fate’s Atropos treads,
She severs threads unseen, cuts doom at will;
No mortal hand may halt the loom she spreads,
Her shears in darkness sing upon the sill.

These walls were never meant for public gaze,
But born of suffering, of a mind undone;
An artist’s tomb, in pigment’s cruel haze,
Where hope expires beneath the absent sun.

So wander here, in silence, in this grief,
Let spectres peer and question what is true—
For in these Black Paintings, in this dark motif,
We glimpse the void, and all it says of you.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Paintings

Ode to the New Office

(or: A Rant in Nine Flights of Despair)

I climb these cursed stairs each day,
Three flights to start, hooray hooray—
A gym disguised as work, they said,
While I drag my bike half-dead.

The floorboards squeak like guilty mice,
Some call it trendy—I call it vice.
Each step a chorus, loud and shrill,
A soundtrack to my waning will.

I hunt for chairs like holy grails,
Each one broken, each one fails.
One rocks like a boat, one’s arms don’t move,
Ergonomics? Not their groove.

The coffee machine’s a needy pet,
Forever cleaning, dripping wet.
It sits not in the kitchen—why?
I trek with water, sigh by sigh.

My soap and clothes, my humble stash,
Have nowhere safe to make a splash.
No nook, no shelf, no private zone,
Just open space and moaning tone.

Open the window—ah, fresh air!
Buskers scream their lungs out there.
Drills, sirens, engines, life’s parade—
In this hip dystopia we’ve made.

The walls, all scraped, “industrial chic,”
But to my eyes? Just half-complete.
They call it “cool,” I call it “bare,”
Unfinished plaster everywhere.

No plug for phones, no charge in sight,
My battery dies—goodnight, goodnight.
The kitchen too could use a plug,
And milk that isn’t fit for slugs.

So here I sit, resigned and sore,
Dreaming of the old office floor.
At least back then, with one short climb,
I reached my desk—and felt sublime.

The Revolution Feeds

Beneath the blood-red, broken moon,
A whisper stirred — too late, too soon —
A promise made in fervent breath,
Now coiled around the throat of death.

The banners burned, their colors bled,
While ghosts of glory crowned the dead;
Each vow once sworn in righteous flame
Now murmurs low a traitor’s name.

The children of the cause, betrayed,
By hands their holy zeal had made —
They turn, they bite, they tear, they moan:
The revolution eats its own.

Through marble halls where tyrants fell,
Now stalks a darker, colder hell;
The martyr’s grin, the hangman’s jest,
Both wear the same immortal crest.

O cruel mirror, cracked and wide,
That shows the beast on every side!
No victor stands — no sinner known —
For all are fed, and all are thrown.

And still beneath that hollow moon,
It feasts, and feeds, and fades too soon;
While echoes hum, in ghastly tone:
The revolution eats its own.

I Know It’s Gonna Blow!

 

(A Dr. Seuss-ish Fable of the Gigawatt Glow)

I know it’s gonna blow!
Oh yes, I know, I know!
They’re building shiny data barns
That hum and buzz and glow!

They call it “smart investment,”
They call it “AI gold,”
But not a single nickel yet
Has jingled when it’s sold.

They spin their tales of power plants,
Of chips that crunch and chew,
But count the watts, not work they’ve done—
That’s what they brag to you!

“Oh, look!” they cry, “a billion watts!
Our grid will surely sing!”
But tell me, dear investor,
What useful thing they bring?

A watt’s not worth a widget,
A spark’s not worth a dime,
If all that juice is guzzled up
Before it learns to rhyme!

They’re burning cash like candles,
They’re stacking dreams like bricks,
They’re lighting up the PowerPoint slides
With billion-dollar tricks!

“EBITDA!” they shout aloud—
A word from dot-com lore,
“It’s profit minus what we owe—
Don’t ask us any more!”

But debts are not imaginary,
And taxes still must bite,
And when the lights go out one day,
They’ll vanish in the night.

For trees don’t grow to heaven’s door,
And wires can’t reach the moon,
And if you can’t afford the power,
Your servers hum a tune—

Of silence, dark and empty racks,
Of fans that spin no more,
Of suckers left with smoking stacks,
And bankers locking doors.

So listen close, my clever friend,
Before you join the show—
When hype outshines the kilowatt,
You know it’s gonna blow!