That toad
Pushing against the wheel
That stuck in the mud feeling
The feeling of being ignored
By the people I work for
The students do progress
Or not,
And I watch as others
Go on.
In my hands are the tools to push forward
Yet fear of change and fear of loss push me back
If I take matters to tribunals
Then my future is uncertain.
No trade unions in my half
Just empty echoes and the feeling of oppression
Bosses who get rich from my work
Being treated better in the client companies than by my own
Where I’m not treated as anything
But disposable
A mild annoyance
Rather than the key player
The mover and shaker.
The wannabe
Jobs given to others
Without being advertised
Then claims of deep thought used
In the recruitment process
When it’s clear
That wasn’t the case.
The boss’ daughter and the boss’ lover
Both promoted
You came out the wrong cock
That’s what it boils down to
Or you don’t suck the right cock.
These weren’t business decisions,
I hope the business survives those moments of nepotism
After a moment
They’ll have to stop taking the piss
Or people will go and they’ll replace them.
With another victim, willing to work
Willing to be treated like badly
For the security of a job.
Someone less good, but more motivated
When they should have trained the people who left
Debt ties us in to these jobs
As do family obligations
And we spend years looking for new opportunities
Not knowing if we’ll find them.
Watching the bitterness build
The frustration.
Watching incompetents get promoted
Because you I am too good in my job
I never will be.
Bad enough for promotion.
Too ill to build another business
Or too scared. Too uncertain.
If I lose everything
Then will I be Kipling’s man?
That half true nonsense
Written for a doomed son
Killed in the trenches
By bad management
The trenches of a hundred years ago
Are not the workplaces of today
But the management needs
Humanity and not to rely
On looking at the financial figures
Instead of the direction we drive.
I despise those idiots
Who sit in those offices
Planning nothing
With no idea of what I do
What do they know
Of the everyday suffering?
Perhaps they feel
As I Fed up with their shitty lot
Fed up with pushing their wheel
Through the mud of work
Larkin spoke of toads
But it’s not that good.
I don’t want to do it anymore.