Terms and Conditions May Apply
A digital checkmark—permission sealed in glass,
The contract scrolled, unread,
as minutes pass.A line of faces under sterile beams,
Each one surrendered by institutional schemes.A
mother’s voice muffled at the intake desk,
Her signature taken as if it’s grotesque,
As attendants trade comfort for control,
And policies swallow the fragments of soul.No need for gavel, no spectacle,
no court—Only fluorescent halls where hope runs short.The forms replace the facts,
the nurse becomes the judge,
Every “I’m just fine” met with the bureaucrat’s nudge.
Her name is entered with a barcode scan,
A wristband numbers the moments since it
began.Consent’s a fiction—they call it care,
But the door is locked and no one’s there.A clipboard replaces instinct,
a pill blunts the will,“Take this, swallow,
let your panic still.”Every question measured, every answer groomed,
Compliance monitored, all resistance
doomed.The rules designed to keep you clean,
The walls adorned with posters serene,
The silence grows louder, institutional
calm—Sedation packaged as emotional balm.
He begged for reason, they offered form,
Anesthetized the thunder with a clinical norm.His fear was assessed,
his urgency filed,
Diagnosis printed while rebellion’s reviled.A threat to the process is met with a
plan:“Observe and document, detain
if you can.”Freedom reduced to scheduled rights,
Bedtime determined by sensor lights.
You never fought, just checked the box,
Accepted the cage, discarded the locks.A war against chaos replaced by peace—But
nothing changes when the questions cease.Terms and conditions govern each dream,
Even nightmares are part of the regime.Every chain is sanctioned,
every sigh reviewed,
You surrendered the right to be confused.
In this haven built from protocol,The soul is itemized, the urge to crawlIs noted,
medicated, then filed away—Your identity parsed for what will obey.A Machine takes notes, audits your mind,Searches
for error, erases the unkind.What is left
when comfort is king?A world without voices, a promise with string.
No resistance, no riot, just submission by design,Your thoughts now monitored,
your choices confined.Terms and conditions—silent and sly—Governing breath,
dictating the why.Agreement was easy,
rebellion was hard—Now you sleep with your freedoms bar-coded
and starred.When the lights dim,
the contract remains—Autonomy bartered for managed chains.And the final line echoes
through the whitewashed hall:This is safe,
this is signed—But it’s not living at all.