He hides himself in a delicate bubble,

Encased in a thin layer of lies,

And if he were to move the slightest inch,
It would pop and his very existence dies.

He sees it all,
Burning buildings, mass murders, the slow depletion of humanity.
He sees it all on the glowing portal
Showing him unfamiliar and inconceivable images.
But is this truly reality?
Not for him.
With a single tear sliding down his cold cheek,
He tweets about the catastrophe
And counts the number of comments.

A digital prison,
The only thing that can grow from the arid terrain
Are parasitic vines that wrap around our corpses
And absorb the last fragments of life clinging to our shriveled souls.

Wake up!

Unreal City.1
Bustling New York.
Atop the River Styx.2
A stream of green corpses with their flaccid faces fastened to their screens
Flood in different directions on their way to work,
Like heated particles of helium
Colliding with one another without making a sound.

Through the heavy fog, I see a man.

I recognize him from Instagram.
As I call out to him, I realize that he notices me but
Does not want to engage.
He lifts his head from his device, makes eye contact,
And quickly looks away.

Wake up!

The heat has become unbearable and

The seas, like the air is steaming more each day.
Poseidon3 is unleashing his merciless wrath on us,
Boiling animals as well in his stew of hatred.
The balance of things undone by money,
The indifferent hunger of the sea.4

Wake Up!

I arise.
The golden sun ascends and a new day emerges from the ashes of yesterday.
As I say every morning, today is the day.
Is it finally time for Departure?5
But I am quickly diverted.
Nicki Minaj had a fight with Cardi B! 6

As she walks in the room,

She sees him alone on the couch embraced by darkness.
He shouts, “Speak to me. Why do you never speak. Speak.
What are you thinking of? What thinking? What?” 7
He eagerly searches her blank pale face,
Hoping to find even a sliver of compassion remaining.

She desperately looks around the room for an answer and

There it is,
The golden snitch.8
She picks it up and asks,
“Hey Siri, what should I say?”
Angry, he shouts again, “You don’t listen anymore.
What do YOU think?”
“Siri, what do I think. What do I feel?
Tell me what I should do. Tell me. Tell. Me. Tell Me!”

Souls are torn apart,

Software updated,
De-bugged,
For what can a human do that machines can’t do better?

What remains is a wasteland.

Twisted relationships,
Rusted promises,
Manufactured love.
Like Gatsby we are obsessed with obtaining the bright green light
Piercing through the shadows,9
But plagued by inauthenticity.

“Did you see Claire’s latest Instagram post?

She’s so skinny, I almost thought she was anorexic.”
I agree. She would be better off not posting pictures of herself.
“She looked so bad in that dress.
She doesn’t even have the curves to look good in it.”
I’d be shocked if she got more than 50 likes.

Sitting on the dinner table,

The frail mother tries in vain to snatch the attention
Of her daughter possessed by the illuminating device.
“Ally can we talk for once?”
Silence.
“Hello, is anyone there?”
She snatches the device from the Ally’s firm grasp
And like Gollum,10 the child screams for the return of her precious,
Her life.

Does the world look just as beautiful without a filter?

Is reality too burdensome to bear?
Will you accept who you’ve become?

Fearful of the answers,

You run deeper into your dream,
Hoping to never awaken
And see the repercussions of your actions,
For you know it’s too late to reverse what has been done.

You slowly replace your flesh with sleek aluminum parts,

Metamorphosing into an inhuman human,
To be relevant,
To be accepted,
To be loved,
Disconnecting the more you try to connect.

Annotations

1. From T.S. Elliot’s poem “The Waste Land.” The term is used to describe the city of London and
its residents who roam around below London Bridge in a lifeless trance.
2. Ovid in the Metamorphoses describes this famous river in ancient Roman mythology as the
bridge between the Underworld and living realm. Newly departed souls would cross this river to enter the
Underworld.
3. The god of the sea in Greek mythology. He is known for wreaking havoc on humans for their
sins.
4. From Gillian Clarke’s “Cantre’r Gwaelod” in which he discusses the unfortunate effects of
climate change.
5. The first stage in the Hero’s Journey theory described in Joseph Campbell’s The Hero with a
Thousand Faces, which states that individuals, no matter their background, are inspired by a specific
odyssey. They often try to replicate this journey in their own lives.
6. This fight occurred between the two famous female rappers on September 7, 2018. Although it
will leave no impact on our global community, the violent altercation attracted more attention from large
media platforms than growing global issues.
7. Quoted from T.S. Elliot’s “The Wasteland.” A woman yells at a man for never sharing his
thoughts and feelings with her.
8. From J.K. Rowlings’ Harry Potter series. The golden snitch is the most important piece in the
wizard sport Quidditch. The game can only end once it is caught.
9. From F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. The main character, Jay Gatsby, is associated with
a green light, which symbolizes his desires for the future. However, he can never truly achieve the
success he seeks because of the facade he creates for himself.
10. From J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings series and The Hobbit. Gollum is a man who is corrupted by
a cursed ring. He becomes obsessed with the object, often calling it “precious.”