For Workshop 4, Caring for Ourselves and One Another, Alternate Activity 2, Burnout – a Misnomer

By Ric Masten (1929–2008), a Unitarian Universalist poet, folk singer and minister. In Ric Masten Speaking (Watsonville, CA: Paper Mache Press, 1990). Used with permission.

burnout

you’ve seen the results

in the shop on the shelf

row after row of grey empty faces

with nothing happening in the glassy eyes

except

a little surface reflection

burnout

you know the symptoms

a history of dependable service

then suddenly for no reason things go dark

and you’re a dead piece of furniture

waiting

to be removed from the living room

burnout

the psychological repairman said

and shrugged and shook his head

having checked everything

except the cord

which of course

was disconnected

in a word “unplugged”

and to think

i nearly went to the dump myself

because someone less than a poet

trying to describe a condition

came up with a misleading term

clearly

a case of burnout demands a second opinion

and this is mine

find an outlet

and if the cord doesn’t reach

move the set