Living Up, Spiraling Down

these are the things that choke you –
starch and bleach
the stiff disguise of black on white
all those obvious displays of over-achievement
the caffeine that drove you through all your good years
toward the blurred promise of button-downed success
forever in the background
beyond the whitewashed, firing line

you must now decide
to take your place in front of, or behind
your wall constructed of slow and hollow time
as you stand, an older man, alone
a vortex of all the mediocrity you cannot live up to