The Heaviness of the Uniform

Throwback to the Poetry Book (My first book) I wrote in 2016

The alarm goes off,

at 6 a.m.

The dread of choosing—shirts, shoes and belts.

He’s happy with fewer trousers, though.

It's Monday. He needs to look business-like.

He drives out at 7.30 a.m. and passes seven traffic lights,

Listens to another New Yorker podcast—a window to the

new life he dreams of.

He reaches the final stretch, where the

Toyota sign is on the left, and

Zenith Bank is on the right.

His heart tightens.

The words of Jorge Luis Borges fade,

and his mind goes into preset mode.

The Robot CEO

Just before he takes a left to park

a taxi cuts him off. He loses it

not at the driver, though he screams at him.

For 23 years, three months and 16 days,

He's been on the trail of his perceived saboteurs.

All kinds of drivers, lazy

Pedestrians, motorbikes, and Government officials.

They keep staring at him driving his Range Rover.

Are they all small-minded cynics

who sneer as a way to become whole?

Regrets scar him, and he bangs his hand on the steering wheel.

He's still here.

He’s still in the same small town.

His mask hasn't changed, apart from the nose

that has gotten big as his face shrinks.

His head is lined with fearful thoughts.

Waiting to explode, if only they can find a way out.

What if, like Tolstoy’s Ivan Illich, he finds out

on his deathbed

that he has lived all his life wrong.

He must leave.

His work clothes have become heavy armour.

He's lost his lightness of being.

He sleeps with the heaviness,

wakes in it and is drowning in it.

He has become his uniform. His tie, his shirt, his dark trousers and

The heavy coins that sleep in his pockets.