The Island of Misfit Toys

[Barry]

We number into the millions, we bedwetters of shame and fear and hungry desire,
Wretched cast-offs and geeky-dweeby fucked up misfits,
Toys of this ill-thought-out planned community.

We live out our lives like everyone else while clutching close
our secret dreams and fears, and our obsessive yearning for gnosis -
secret knowledge - and the understanding that comes with same.

We share our good fortune with our peers while keeping secret and isolated our dread and our selfish wants or needs or lack of companionship,
driving our cars over bridges, onto roads, under mountains, across waters
onto fields of dreams and visions and nightmare prophecies, insecure longing for the unthinking release of death or catatonia, insanity - the redemption of sacrifice and a loveless marriage.

And all the time wandering, wondering, thinking...
I am the one?
Is she the one?
Are we together?
Will this ever end?

And we never do get our answers, do we?
Because sometimes this life itself is the answer.
And sometimes this life gives you everything you could ever want, regardless of what you really need, everything you ever asked for or dreamed.
Everything up to and including the girl.

First written 4/14/93, when the author was 29, less than a month before he met the girl, his wife. Originally the final line was "Everything but the girl."

[Arcadia]

Toys of this ill-thought-out planned community.

I specially liked this line, interesting to re-read old poems!!!!!. Curious, at 29, and maybe despite the let´s call it real-real facts, I had the feeling of a bitter-sweet anarquía not at all a planned community!!

gracias for sharing!!!!!

[Barry]

Anarquia? I like that word. I may use it.
Already by 29 I had come to see human culture (or Westren Culture; for that's really all I have experience of) not as some rudderless ship with no one at the wheel, but as flowing by design. The hand on that wheel is advertising. It's not the shows on TV that change peoples attitudes and opinions, modify their thinking and behavior, so much as it's the ads. And the advertisers know this. It'd be wonderful if they used this tool to turn us all into better people, bring on the elightened new age and all that, but they don't. They use it to turn us all into better consumers. That's why money truly is the root of all evil (ill), because it's not goodness or excellence people are striving for but profit.
None of this is random. It's all by design. That's why I wrote "ill-thought-out planned community."

Thanks for your comments and insight, Arcadia. Always a pleasure.

Peace,
Barry

[goldenmyst]

Barry, I can hardly remember, that is vividly viscerally, what it was like to be 29. I remember the events, mostly. But it seems like a dream. I love this narrative. The change of ending gave the perspective of your older self contrasted with younger. You are an accomplished writer and human.

John

[Arcadia]

None of this is random. It's all by design

this what??, random opposed to design?, design a la Coco Chanell, Huxley, Matsumoto, Maseru Emoto, Sheldrake or something else? ... mmm.... no idea!

gracias for sharing your experiences & theories with us!

[Barry]

This refers to everything I stated above that line. Meaning, the use of the media, particularly advertising, as a tool to manipulate a population into being, not better people, but better consumers.

None of that is random. It's all by design. Design meaning on purpose, not by accident or chance.

Shit doesn't just happen. It is made to happen.

Peace,
Barry

[Arcadia]

Meaning, the use of the media, particularly advertising, as a tool to manipulate a population into being, not better people, but better consumers. : yeah, it seems that happens frecuently

Shit doesn't just happen. It is made to happen.: that made me smile!

peace & gracias, Barry!

[Barry]

Last night, lying in bed before falling asleep, I felt the need to restate...I don't think use of the media, particularly advertising, to manipulate a population for any reason is a good thing. I'm just saying it happens. Would that it would happen for the one reason instead of the other.

Peace,
Barry