I chuckled at the wiry youth
Secreting products from the shelves
Under his coat, down his pants
“Don’t be too obvious!” I said
And let him be on his way
All those hours sat a desk,
The dreaded corporate cubicle,
Surfing the net on big business dime
Planning a future for myself
Fuck ’em if they’re this inefficient
And so when the falling down stood up
To burn the factory to the ground
Fists were raised in a tragic solidarity
We stuck it to the man, at least
Until we had to go back to work
Inspired by thoughts after reading Work Poem by Miro in Issue 7 of Suburban Witchcraft which brought to mind these lyrics from Laws Against Laughing by The Crucifucks…
Some really good friends of mine
They blew up a factory
No one really knows how it happened
And they are still running free
And I think it’s funny…
…and leading to memories of a couple of my jobs.
The first stanza happened when I was working at a popular supermarket in Sydney. The job I enjoyed but I hated the manager so much that I just didn’t care about people stealing stuff.
The second stanza details my corporate years where ideas for improvement were always rejected because no one could be found to pay for them. This meant about five years of maintaining a functioning system and starting up a secondary business as a hobby while there. Fuck ’em!
The third stanza imagines the idea of sympathy for the guy in Falling Down losing his mind and blowing up his place of work, followed by the realisation that we still need to go to work the next day to get our proverbial dollar.