Poetry Corner

I'm taking three classes this semester. My Monday night class is English comparative Literature. I have a very cool professor who likes to work on a little bit of poetry every class. We're using A Pocketful of Poems: Vintage Verse for this purpose and it's actually a really nice collection.

Anyway, I wanted to share one of the poems that I happened upon while browsing through the book the other day. This is for all my girlfriends toiling away at the office.

The Secretary Chant
Marge Piercy 1934 -

My hips are a desk.
From my ears hang
chains of paper clips.
Rubber bands form my hair.
My breasts are wells of mimeograph ink.
My feet bear casters.
Buzz. Clink.
My head is a badly organized file.
My head is a switchboard
where crossed lines crackle.
Press my fingers
and in my eyes appear
credit and debit.
Zing. Tinkle.
My navel is a reject button.
From my mouth issue canceled reams.
Swollen, heavy, rectangular
I am about to be delivered
of a baby
Xerox machine.
File me under W
because I wonce
was
a woman.


Metropolis 1927 Dir. Fritz Lang

The first time I read this poem it gave me chills. I found it kind of terrifying. As I read it I could see this woman being transformed into a machine, feel the dehumanization that occurs bit by bit every day as she performs her office duties under the cold flourescent lights of a deadening corporation.

"Michelle, help me with this fax. Michelle, I need you to overnight this to India. Michelle, make ten copies of this presentation and bind it for me in half an hour." and so on and on. I joke that I have job security because I'm the only person here who knows how to work the copier.

The problem with the secretary's (administrative assistant's etc.) job is this: Anyone who is intelligent/organized/together enough to handle this job, is also too intelligent/organized/together to want to do it for very long.

(sigh)

How much longer do I have in school before I can get out of here and write for the NY Times?