we are a generation of lost children.
kids who never grew up.                         
                                             [or got the chance to]
the ones left sitting by the window sills, dreaming.
in the arms of our imaginary mothers, believing.
spinning stories, and tales `
of the wonders that lay beyond these concrete forests

we hummed ourselves to sleep,
to the tune of these mechanical lullabies.
electronic bleeps,                                pre-recorded.
the soft droning of the television set.
a black box of static, comforting even,


numbed our senses and numbed our minds.
blanked out all the troubles, thoughts and worries
temporarily.

i think.
we were never kids. only ever
babies. or young adults.
stuck, trapped forever in between the state of growing up
and growing older.

we believed.
and danced. to tunes we've never heard before.
built. castles in our dreams.
much more elegant, regal and exquisite(d)
than our Lego box sets.
and still we pretend.
to be genuinely pleased. engrossed. absorbed.
in the trinkets, you piled in our stockings.
every year.

the soft crackle of the gramophones,
worn curves of the old mantelpieces
in the garage, consumed, hidden, disappearing
under the grey drapes of the years.

dust bunnies. eliminated.
zapped away with the whir of vaccum cleaners
and the crisp white aprons of the cleaning lady

i wondered. and asked,
your imaginary (absent)  presence
if i could keep on in the jar.

the landlady would never have to know.
it'd be our little secret.
except you were never there.

and she said she had to do her job
a massacre. i imagined. the battle.
a war, of epic dimensions.
like perhaps that of star wars.
intergalactic. i presumed.

a war. a call to arms.
they with their wit; primal; ancient;
standing, in unity.
against the raging unit of electricit.y
the odds were against them .
but never would their courage fail.
nor would their beliefs.

they would battle till the end,
a fight to break free.
they were fighting for a noble cause.
so with valour pooling in their hearts,
they stood their ground.
they believed.

one day, after generations,
maybe, one day they'd prevail.
there was hope.
one day they'd turn the tide against the machine.

in our little hearts we rooted.
for the tinny little dust bunnies standing their ground.
filled. with premonition of their imminent fate.

we'd all fade into obscurity.
sucked into the whirlwind of havoc.
consumed by consumerism.
ground back into dust, before we even got to heave our last hacking breath.

we sold our daydreams to progress
the need of the greater good.
sold our souls to democracy.
we lost the inner child we almost had.
we pledged ourselves to our country.
a foreign land. that we'd never understand.
it's not ours.

never bought. sold.
going, going. gone.


years ago, we would have answered the call.
to arms. to charge and tear limbs from [other] limbs.
for an idealistic notion we thought we understood

now all we do is to dance around,
on tippy toes, side stepping each other
like the awkward sidewalk mime
of politics.

to waltz round the court,
dressed, elaborately in our fancy terms,
jargons no one knows,
shinning, polished and refined.

the words the slip off the tip of our tongues,
 words too oddly foreign today.

language, falling apart.


we are the lost generation who found.
solace.
                                                      when something happened.

the ones who won,
a war never fought.

the ones who never gave up. fighting.
we never knew we could.

lost.

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