Here’s a ‘colleague’,
Low paid, low-grade,
Whilst the shark-like supervisor hovers over him;
Aspirations limited,
Horizons restricted,
He ekes out a living in the supermall
Through which a procession of drudges trudge with screaming kids,
Dole-lined faces and grim relentlessness;
The poor feeding the poor,
Whilst poor Roger stands at the door
Greeting us -
Some Kafkaesque nightmare conjured up to crush the spirit,
The slow cycle of poverty in, poverty out,
Measured and weighed by poverty,
Ticked off by poverty,
Whilst billionaires feed off their work ethic.
27/06/07
In the UK superstore drones are now called ‘colleagues’ to make them imagine that they’re valued. This poem was triggered off by being greeted by one such ‘colleague’ called Roger.
Some superstores (not necessarily in Britain) specialise in paying grotesquely low wages (topped up in various ways by the state) and cutting prices to the bone; the dirt-poor trudge in, served by the dirt-poor, whilst the owners become billionaires.
The ‘dole’ is a uk term for unemployment benefit.
