I try to stay away,

stay off the grid, resist

the impulse to let fly.

No good can come of this:

I cannot change your mind.

But sometimes I’m too stoked,

I have to vent or else explode.

And then the invitation’s there: please step this way.

The silo and the echo chamber usher in

the apoplexies of the day.

So up it goes, the link, the pic, the facile howl.

I’ve posted what was “on your mind”,

I’ve shared the shit that swills about the brain

and straightway know the soapbox hollowness

of howling out the pain.

But still I leave it there and still I check

who Liked, who Commented,

my very own below-the-line:

the kitchen-table trolls and, worst of all,

the Friends who seem entirely blind.

I thought I knew them,

thought they had a heart,

but here they are, they’re fuming,

fulminating, spewing out their poison.

Even worse, they’re quoting Jordan Peterson.