Disarray's destruction

when you have tried to nibble your way to freedom don't get caught

Guinea-P at rest....

A BEAUTIFUL DAY OF SANDWICH MAKING HELL

The sun is blinding, my eyes are stinging, the ground is crunching, it is repetitive, it is fast I am running. The pressurised air spurts out at speeds I shudder to think about, fast enough for a loose screw to shoot through someone’s leg like a bullet something we learnt on our first day. The conveyer’s don’t stop and neither do I, I am fast I am running. I am not fast enough, not strong enough, not loud enough, not tough enough.  And if you don’t run, you don’t look back on what it was you had before because the chances are, you are only there out of desperation, but it takes you, it takes what little energy and personality it was that you had before. Until you are nothing- but a breathing worn machine like the conveyors. And I am running I won’t become metallic- mindless. I won’t become like them.  The sandwiches spurt by so fast you can’t even blink it is cold and your nose drips, but you can’t leave the belt so you have to wipe it on your sleeve-or they shout.  The older ones make it look easy they chatter away like neighbours over garden fences as they top the bread, spread the chicken, put the tomatoes and lettuce on. They swear at the young ones for “ not “ trying hard enough it doesn’t matter if it’s your first day or last hour-still the same.  And then it dawns on you that these are little people who care for nothing. I am running I have startled the ponies and they run from me like I am a machine. I can hear the pressurised air spurting out; I can hear the sirens and conveyor belts, even if I am in the middle of a field with a herd of startled ponies. As they bitch about you “ I’ve told her” because they haven’t shown you properly you see how worn they look how tired and how much of their life the place has sucked out of them. You do as your told or try to because they haven’t shown you properly and they shout again. Your body aches and eyes are heavy but you have to keep pace the conveyors don’t stop and sandwich after sandwich you top and push down hard. Its hurts so much you want to cry and you don’t know how much time has passed because they don’t let you see the only clock in the room.  We rely on them, the managers with their clipboards and plastic phones and the digital clocks they have pinned to their Daz white tops, they don’t tell, think you don’t know. But my body knows it, it hurts too much I can tell I know that this is wrong it has gone on far too long. I KNOW I KNOW, I RUN, I RUN. I am not dumb. One by one people disappear and then the older ones talk “ and we should have had a third break” they have found something better to complain about they want to go home.  They threaten us say that anybody who leaves is fired but nobody cares they walk out I RUN I RUN. The sun makes my eyes sting the evening is warm and bright the sun is almost setting, it looks like it had been a good day. But I don’t know up before the sun rose I can’t see the time of day pass in that place it is only when I get out I know how late it is, that the whole day is gone. Because when I make it home all I will want to do is sleep, and I will dream of the sirens and alarms because I hear them all the time. Even if I am awake with my head on a soft pillow the sounds don’t stop, they are constant, they are chasing me and I run.

The man on the wall gives me a funny look as I sit and rest, he takes a bite of a shop bought sandwich. I recognise the packaging right down to the yellow sticker. He takes a bite, and winces

“ Not worth shit” he complains. 

( a response to the forced sandwich)