THE VERTEBRARCHY

The hardworking men with backbones

Who stand up straight

Oversee the Spineless Earth,

Whose residents are spineless

And thus have no vertebrae.

Most have become sessile blobs of flesh

Who sit and consume without budging

So much as an inch off

Of their pillowed recliners.

Some have grown all their lives

With their backs broken, perpetually

Hunched over with severe cases

Of scoliosis, dragged down by the weight

Of their computer-heads,

Too afraid and weak to stand up

And stare at their powerful

Leaders in the eye

With resolve and with intent.

The hardworking men with backbones

Shake their heads and complain

At how passive and lazy the world

Has become (though some are elated

Being the Kings of Earth, having earned

Their titles through endless toil).

To the point buildings

And bridges are sagging

Under a lack of maintenance

And frankly, an abundance of

Carelessness.

To the point everyone

Has become akin to sloths

Moving on slow-moving vehicles

And flying on slow-moving craft,

And thinking slow thoughts,

One word each day

Drifting about without goals

Or ambitions or dreams,

Expecting to be fed like infantile

Little babies under a hedonistic culture.

To the point

The brains and brain stems

Of the people have withered 

And atrophied, turning these blobs into

Mindless beings of flesh.

To the point the men with backbones

Have given up hope on Earth,

And left on their rockets

Towards a new home--

A place where their hard work

Will ensure their survival

As opposed to their species’ fear,

Laziness, and lack of backbone.

In fact, thought the Men with Spines,

Why not become men of bone altogether

And rid ourselves of our fleshy limitations,

And inject ourselves with ceaseless energy

To induce ceaseless progress, farther and farther?

On a foreign word, the Men with Spines

Did not realize, and have already forgotten,

That their species’ desire for a painless

Utopia, and their progress towards living

Lives of peace and comfort,

Was what made them spineless in the first place.

No war or disease or conflict or poverty

Left Mankind with all the free time in the world.

And what did Man do with that free time?

Waste it on mindless nothingness and passivity, of course.

Now, the Men with Spines,

Injecting themselves with pure adrenaline,

And de-regulating their bodies’ needs for rest

--Becoming seemingly tireless machines

With skins and body parts of metal,

Have thrown themselves into a different

Kind of pain or hell-- a seeming Utopia

Where everyone is, yes, very hardworking,

But too hardworking, to the point

All the problems of the Universe can

Be solved with the flick of a switch,

And all danger averted by the push of a button.

The Men with Spines and backbones have now become Spineless,

The limit of progress having approached 0 on the coordinate plane.