The Litany of the Machine's Parts David Hampton Litrus staff “Project”
The turning screws shall hold together struts and towers of steel and rubber
cable spread and vision blurred,
the calming roots no longer ash and oak,
concrete slabs are the base of all things.
"skyline"
Click, and a tape rotates on wheel, read off as voices condescending.
Second click, with timeless music filling space for eternities.
From this unconquerable situation,
hope arises in a second voice,
but it lists online options,
menued lists which lead forever to the timeless-ness
Between menus,
worlds are born,
civilizations crumble. For a civil war,
please hold.
"jazz"
I am a spring that's connected to a lever, that much I know,
connected to a machine which is keeping time,
a steady tick balancing out imperfection,
making sure every step is completed.
A formula based on assumption which self-validates
as media mandated mobs... mechanically meet and masticate
all and any merchandise we put upon my shelf. "cashier"
In a time long past, a man was left a step away from the sucker,
and built a market.
He hired a local boy,
set him to cleaning garbage
and laughed as his fellow men
fell about him for trash,
when sparkling clean.
As the market grew in complexity,
the parts became closer to the arm and leg,
the thinking became cold and calculating.
Predatory is not the word—
passionless and passive.
The books became electric,
the method mechanical, the feeling binary.
And the men tired of themselves, built as metal.
The middle part of the machine calls itself your friend.
"management"
Such a simple job can be done by a machine,
but the human touch comforts the guilty soul of this mechanical existence,
makes the lie of no meaning easier to switch parts within the machine
so quickly. "Human resources"
Somewhere in the bowels, a database grows,
matching bolt to nut, as the fallen-apart tractors are dismantled,
sorted and used to build extensions of the great machine.
The course is natural as industries are perfected,
the machinery advances, built of(in) more complicated patterns
of the same spare slippery single screws.
"agriculture"
There were the gears of the machine
but how much did they cost?
In between the days of their use
They’re melted down as oil, sliding through
other sections of replaceable industry.
"sustainability"
(mmkay, here we go)
Feel like I’m the butt
the punchline of a joke
&my whole life makes me want ta choke.
Stuck pluggin in a rut
just trying to croak(not to)?
best way out, blow a lot of smoke.
(chorus)
Don't want to wake up from this nightmare,
100 miles an hour (off life's edge), and I don't care.
Can't keep living this nightmare,
100 miles an hour (off this cliff), 100 miles and I don't care.
Gotta put my foot forward every morning,
stop dragging my body like I'm in mourning,
dead body stepping, alive without living,
don't want to get up, listen to their laughing,
no longer keep climbing, striving, so off the edge I'm driving.

(chorus)
Don't want to wake up from this nightmare,
100 miles an hour (off life's edge), and I don't care.
"Can't keep living this nightmare,
100 miles an hour (off this cliff),100 miles and I don't care.

"doe Ray banned"
Standing as if empowered, places of business,
being the mediation of an industrial lubricant.
The fluid of currency is a gaping wound?
No, but it is unemptiable, as if to say, it were the same.
Under the fabric of your pocket is your consideration of wealth.

So spread your...
wallet and tell me what it's worth,
and maybe we'll discuss your tip, appreciating percents.
They spend so much, they change the future,
so spread your wallet, set the standards of a bill’s unpaid credit.
It's when you believe something has worth,
you’re equating a piece of paper, without apology.
Quote me a price and sign your name,
there is no more shame in the bill of purchase (I know our* rights). *your
If you'll spend the money, you'll agree to my value. *to things of value*
This the statement of morality today, not unlike yesterday

So spread your...
wallet and tell me what it's worth,
and maybe we'll discuss your tip, appreciating percents.
They spend so much, they change the future,
so spread your wallet, set the standards of a bills unpaid credit.

"dollar quo"
That train's engineer is making improvements of the motor,
ever progressing as the engine is streamlined; the train picks up pace,
a reassembly —that 2% improvement here, across the line,
the passengers get* no gaurantee on the present quality of the ride.
*have signed for*
Sitting in the passengers’ cabin I built a spying glass
to look down the side of the train,
in the curve of my glass, I can
just make out the conductor's cabin,
and it has no emergency rip-cord. I saw the length of the railway to
its unfinished end, up ahead...
The horror there is one of history. Clean cut, desolate* men resolutly,
laying down track and hammer, laying down track and hammer ahead of them.
Ahead of the thumping pistons, trying to outrun a workman's whistle.