I can’t do this anymore
Not that anyone cares
Not that I’m not crazy rich in most every good
at the moment

I can’t do this anymore
Not that you should care
Not that I ever gave you a reason
to care

I can’t do this anymore
But I guess I will
What else would I do?

I can’t do this even one more day
But I’ve said that
so many times before
and now all those days hang forever
in what was done,
clearly contradicting my testimony,
or should I say,
testy moaning?

I can’t do this today
It’s not so bad
but it has so little to do with me
the dissonance deafens

I know you don’t care at all
I can’t even really care

Do you remember the bombs that hollowed out the town?
A boy lay in a hospital bed with no legs and no more family members
Somebody said it was a real shame

When one complains
against such a backdrop
one feels silly

The story goes
you need to go
so you can do what’s needed

The story holds
that you hold
important cards
that must be played
better than you can you play them here and now and with these resources

The story capers on
and you with it

I think LLM hallucinations are like human sins
One gets caught up in the beauty of the pose
One gets barrel-rolled by the grandeur of the story and the certainty of the landing

I can’t do this anymore.
It’s too lonely and boring.
Too stressful and pointless.
And I feel like a failure,
like a soldier hiding in his barracks
as the decisive battle rages.
I am hiding between some bushes in a camp of pitched tents.
My friends are sharing cigarettes and jokes as they march towards agony most likely punctuated by death.

I can’t do this anymore.
I’ve no more friends and I’ve lost my taste for cigarettes.

I can’t do this anymore.
I’ll still show up,
but I am the hollow man
and in me there is nothing,
no crew of fighting men
to sneak out and hack apart the drunken fools of over-confident Ilium.

I am the hollow man
Pretending to listen
Making like I am talking
Completing tasks as if I were inside my actions.

And then at night I sneak back home
with my wages
I pay my bills and tell myself I will never go back to that lie

But of course
it’s no lie
It’s just regular life
for a regular person
in this place and time I got myself born into
via whatever sacred and/or profane mysteries

I can’t do this anymore
I will do this
It’s my life
It’s not even a bad one

Author: Cal I. Gullah
Editorial Team and Rose Petal Strewers: Bartleby Willard and Amble Whistletown