This is an unlovely ode to drudgery of all kinds: professional, domestic, emotional and mental. This is also a bit of a kick to the steaming underbelly of corporatocracy or political capitalism. For those still in its grips, tomorrow is another day, and then another, and another …. This is to deep breaths, cathartic vocalization and despite it all, inner peace ☮️

I sit here with my tea
It is past dusk, nighttime has come
My day is done, the drudgery
For now, has been overcome
I know I should call it living
A productive life, goal-driven
One that should give me belly warmth
The kind that you find
In food that hugs your soul 
While it slowly dissolves
Into dreams and hopes and 
Forging on; wanting more; 
The bar always moving up
There are no rests, there are no stops

But Drudgery O Drudgery!
When I call you out for thee
That word becomes cathartic 
As it washes off the aches
The tiredness, the ire
The fresh and dutiful daily inks
Of brimstone and hellfire
It’s like a song, a one word air
It fills the air with daring
A momentary “damn it all!” 
No fear of anything 
Celestial, terrestrial or alien

Drudgery oh drudgery!
I have been taught to revere thee
In your sugar-coated entirety 
But to speak of you 
Honestly
In all your tri-syllabic impiety
Is to seek out fate 
When she should be
Left alone
Picking at her murphied* bones

And yet Drudgery Och Drudgery
There are days when I acknowledge thee
For what you are:
A stinging thorn in my soul 
A worldly curse, a profanity
And that is when I perceive
An adroit lightness of my being.
When I call you out, I feel
A joyful whoosh of relief 
My hapless spirit is airborne
Again, and I am fortified 
For another day spent in your arms
Ceaseless, easeless Drudgery
With a name that’s yet a purging charm.

* The title of the poem is an adaptation of Karl Marx’s critique of political economy - Das Kapital

* Murphied: The word is derived from Murphy's Law (Whatever can go wrong will go wrong). Victim of bad luck and circumstance.