Literary Propaganda

At five in the morning my alarm clock buzzed,
jolting me awake to its urgent monotonous call
to rise and seize the day as so many of my ancestors
did long before alarm clocks were even around-
back when only an imperceptible change of light
behind the thick woven window curtains and the faint
call of a rooster summoned them to take up their
brooms, their mops, their rags, their gloves, their buckets
and shovels and go out under the pinprick gazes of the
still-visible stars to do the work appointed unto them
before breakfast in a few hours-
and as it buzzed, my well-trained arm reached over
to pause it in its excitement to start the day that had only
just heard the shot of the gun to begin the race of
today's desperate sprints and hurdles in order to achieve
what the experts call "success," or, in other words,
a perfect job with the perfect salary and perfect freedom
and a perfect house and the perfect wardrobe and
the perfect relationship and the perfect friends and perfect
everything in between.
I know that if I make excuses to stay in the warm comfort
of my sheets I will never make it out of the house on time
to my less-than-perfect job with a less-than-perfect salary
in order to have a somewhat perfect freedom that may
lead me to a semi-perfect relationship that my equally
imperfect acquaintances may not perfectly approve of,
so I resign myself to yet another menial, less-than-perfect day.
The hours tick by slowly, and rush-hour traffic is at its
absolute worst. When I finally make it home to my affordable
apartment, I am sorely tempted to simply collapse on my
bed and sleep the late afternoon and evening away.
But I can't.
Tomorrow a huge business project is due, and I still need
to correspond with someone who is in charge of the main part
of the said project and has not yet fulfilled his share of responsibility.
This done, I plop on the couch, exhausted.
A rather dusty novel sits on the side table, one which had been
my favorite during my youth. Perhaps a quick read wouldn't hurt
before a nap before dinner.
Soon I am lost in the old favorite's prose that had so richly
nourished my adolescent need to know that there was
some sort of order and truth in this world, and not everything
had to be seen through a cynical eye.
My soul is relieved of the heavy burden of routine that had
made it dusty and worn. Now it is neatly polished and shines,
shines like the sun on the summer solstice.
Forget a nap. I'm reading.