At the Airport

EXISTENTIAL EXTRAPOLATIONS: PART SIX

Somewhere in Melbourne. By the author.

The relativity of eternity
We’re victims of modernity
Complexity isn’t flexibility
Who’s this person sitting next to me?

A long shot in a brutal state
Waiting for announcement gate
Sometimes the ones that do survive
Are the ones that are least alive

The lowest common denominator
Now the target of corporate predator
Culture becomes a simulation
Of someone else’s celebration

But I’ve no right to take offence
Better to sit on the fence
Contemplating to innocuation of language
Unless to describe a sandwich

But the vegan Singapore goat fusion
Only adds to my confusion
I thought that I’d be chilled
But for some water I’ll be billed

Surcharges now apply to thinking
Even if I haven’t been drinking
Obscurity is now a feature
Designed to baffle any creature

And the labyrinthine refund policy
Makes a successful outcome an oddity
The idea that words now trump an action
Is starting to gain traction

Poison food trapped by vacuum seal
Has no regard for how I feel
So they pipe in forest noises
To indulge our lack of choices

Conformity becomes a competition
Have you got the latest edition?

Why is everything now grey?
And when did the colour go away?
Green and red saved for emergency
To promote a sense of urgency

Within architectural visual violence
Designed for maximum compliance
And now that I’m a captive
The pricing seems adaptive

But promises are easy
If you don’t care for the queasy
I could deconstruct your public effigy
But the inclination is not within me

So I say that I don’t buy it
I just long to have some quiet
Sure, I know what we’ve been taught
All disproved at the airport

Author’s Note

It’s been a whirlwind trip to Melbourne to catch up with a brother I haven’t seen in over a decade. Inevitably, there is sense of loss accompanied by a lack of excitement for the replacements. Still, writing this at the airport yesterday helped the time fly.

It’s Australia Day today. This one feels tangentially relevant. You can read Part Five here:

https://substack.com/home/post/p-182789269