I Am A Desperate Man

I think this is more a gut reaction to how life can steam roll us at times. We all feel the need to efficate. Sometimes we get behind the 8 ball and struggle to recover.

I am a desperate man

I scavenge for opportunity

I look for the easy way

I look for what is fast

I look for what will serve me now

because I fear tomorrow is endangered

hiding will not serve me

so I run naked through the street

though I have lost my shirt in a bet with my employer

the wager was was a career

he held the cards

as did my prior employer

and the ones before

my livelihood is akin to my youth

it wanes quickly

fear is my comfort

my slaver

my friend

my lover

my enemy

and I am its prey

I do not strike out for gain

premeditation is a luxury

a luxury for those with time

or who time has befriended

the hustle is art

quick hands master it

the wise have mastered those with quick hands

I am not wise

I am desperate

Author's Note

I'm unconcerned with grammar in poetry and let it live as independent from that kind of structure, so that's not not feedback I'm looking for. Just tell me what you think:
*Was it interesting?
*Did you connect with it?
*What did it make you feel?
*Was it powerful?
*Etc. ...

Reviews

[John the Baptist]

The poem is quite revealing of the consciousness of the speaker, who seems both impatient and fearful. Of interest is the mention of having had several different employers and a fascination with "the hustle" and "the easy way." Somehow I think these things have a lot to do with his being desperate.

[willbradley]

Thanks for the feedback. Yeah, there are elements of it I relate to and put myself into it a bit. To me, it's less about autobiography and more about experiencing the disruption that can send us spiraling, panicking for change to occur.

[Fran Marie]

I'm picking up on feeling of frustration
and a touch of general anxiety ..wanting
things to happen faster and as planned
but they don't.. I do like the way you
wrote this. very well expressed

[willbradley]

Thanks very much!!

[NhanHoang]

That was interesting, sad, I didn't connect the dots though, so it says you were desperate for things and just enjoy day by day not worrying about tomorrow?

[willbradley]

It's more about when we are feeling at the end of our ropes, we have a tendency to be rash and not think things through, in the first bit anyway. Mazybe I'll try to make that more clear in the writing at some point. But yeah, it's a little sad, and reflective of a state of being I've seen over and over, in other people, in myself. I think it's a pretty common issue actually.

[NhanHoang]

alright, thank you.

[willbradley]

Thank you! I appreciate the insight.

[barleygirl]

In my lifetime (I'm 65) I've seen many many friends go thru jobs, thinking they were the ones with a problem keeping a job, & then as the decades roll by & this escalates & becomes news -- wow! So it wasn't the workers, after all. It was bad management & bad government. I think lots of people were hoodwinked into accepting lower & lower wages as their lives went onward, rather than making progress, as one might expect. Your poem reminds me of how this person, experiencing all this over the years, might feel (((HUGS)))

[willbradley]

Thanks! I think you pretty much nailed it.