In days of old, when clocks were slow,
And information’s pace was low,
A man could sit upon a stone,
And think a thought distinctly own.
He’d watch the clouds, he’d read a book,
He’d give the world a lingering look.
But that was then, and this is now,
We’ve lost the knack, forgotten how.
A crisis looms, a mental shrink,
We hover on the jagged brink.
The trends confirm, the charts descend,
We cannot focus, cannot tend.
We asked for facts, the stats arrived,
To show how focus hasn’t thrived.
The numbers stark, the data mean:
We last just moments on a screen.
In Two Thousand Four, the science said,
Before our brains had totally fled,
We held a thought for minutes two,
A half more added to the view.
One hundred fifty seconds strong,
To dwell on where we might belong.
But recently, the studies show,
How low the heavy bar can go.
Dr. Gloria Mark, with stopwatch keen,
Has timed us on the glowing screen.
And now we switch, we flip, we dart,
Before the task can even start.
Forty-seven seconds flat!
We barely beat the household cat.
We click a link, we check a text,
We’re frantically wondering what is next?
They say the goldfish in the bowl,
Possesses more self-control.
Nine seconds he can stare at food,
While we are in a scrolling mood.
Eight seconds is the human span,
For modern woman, modern man.
Defeated by a swimming pet,
The strangest competition yet.
The books are gathering heavy dust,
The bindings crack, the pages rust.
To read of whales and white obsessed,
Is now a frantic, failed test.
“Call me Ishmael,” starts the tale,
But then we see an email fail.
We put it down, we grab the phone,
And leave poor Ishmael all alone.
The Russians wrote for days on end,
With plots that twist and legs that bend.
Tolstoy’s tome, a heavy brick,
Now makes the modern stomach sick.
“Too long,” we cry, “Too dense! Too deep!
Just give me something while I sleep!”
We want the summary, short and sweet,
A tweet-sized version of the feat.
“War and Peace” is now “W&P,”
A TikTok dance for us to see.
A ten-part thread to tell the plot,
Of who was loved and who was shot.
The nuance lost, the beauty gone,
We scroll until the break of dawn.
We skim the surface, skip the middle,
And treat meaningful art like a riddle.
The movie theater, sacred space,
Where darkness held us in our place,
Is now a torture chamber dark,
Where focusing is wildly stark.
Three hours long? You must be mad!
To sit that long is simply bad.
Unless I have a second screen,
To bridge the gaps inside the scene.
We watch a film, but check the cast,
To see how long the show will last.
We Google endings in the start,
To see if heroes fall apart.
We cannot wait for plots to bloom,
We need the answer in the room.
The slow-burn drama dies a death,
We haven’t got the mental breath.
The “TL;DR” rules the land,
A stamp we put on every hand.
“Too Long; Didn’t Read,” we say with pride,
With nowhere left for thoughts to hide.
A memo sent from boss to team,
Is treated like a fever dream.
“Just give the bullet points,” we plead,
“For sentences, I have no need.”
The executive summary is the king,
The only song we know to sing.
If you can’t say it in a line,
Then frankly, friend, you’re wasting time.
Nuance is a casualty,
Of efficiency and urgency.
We strip the meat to find the bone,
And sit upon a hollow throne.
But here’s the twist, the ironic turn,
For which the patient people yearn.
As focus fades and minds retreat,
A new elite takes up the seat.
The future belongs to the few,
Who sit and think the whole way through.
The ones who read the boring text,
Will be the ones who conquer next.
Imagine now, the interview,
For CEO or VP too.
They will not ask for grades or schools,
Or mastery of coding tools.
They’ll put you in a wooden chair,
And leave you sitting silent there.
“Just listen now,” the board will say,
“To this lecture on the price of hay.”
An hour passes, drone and dry,
About the wheat, about the rye.
The candidate who checks their wrist,
Is immediately dismissed.
The one who taps a phantom phone,
Is sent away to struggle alone.
But she who sits with eyes awake,
Will take the job, the cash, the cake.
For scarcity creates the worth,
The rarest skill upon the Earth.
Is not to code, or sell, or preach,
But sit within a teacher’s reach.
To hold a thought for sixty minutes,
Without the urge to break the limits.
To read a contract line by line,
Will be the hallmark of the fine.
The shallow mind, the rapid scroll,
Takes a heavy, unseen toll.
We know the facts, we know the stats,
We’re turning into mindless gnats.
Professor Mark has warned us loud,
To step away from the clicking crowd.
The “switching cost” is far too high,
Our productivity runs dry.
It takes us twenty minutes plus,
To get back on the mental bus.
Once interrupted by a ping,
We cannot do a single thing.
We cycle round in anxious loops,
Jumping through digital hula hoops.
Exhausted by the end of day,
Though we’ve done nothing, in a way.
The universities will change,
To something that will seem quite strange.
The hardest course, the PhD,
Will be “Sustained Attention Three.”
No books to write, no labs to run,
Just staring at the setting sun.
If you can watch it till it’s dark,
You get the grade, you hit the mark.
The resume of Twenty-Thirty,
Won’t list the hands that got so dirty.
It will say: “Watched a movie straight,
Without checking the viral debate.
Read a book of fifty pages,
And felt as wise as ancient sages.
Listened to a friend complain,
Without checking the weather rain.”
We laugh, but oh, the truth is stinging,
While in our pockets phones are ringing.
We trade the deep for shallow wide,
And lose the universe inside.
The dopamine is cheap and fast,
But nothing built on it can last.
A sugar rush for hungry brains,
That leaves us bound in wireless chains.
So here’s the challenge, should you choose,
There’s nothing left for you to lose.
Try to read a chapter through,
Without checking on what is new.
Try to watch a film in full,
Resist the notification’s pull.
You might find out, to your surprise,
The world is bright before your eyes.
But let’s be real, between us friends,
Before this lengthy poem ends.
You skimmed the middle, didn’t you?
You jumped a stanza, maybe two.
You saw the length and felt the dread,
“I’ll just read the end,” you said.
I catch you now, I see your crime,
You’re trying to save your precious time.
It’s okay, friend, I do it too,
We’re all part of this restless zoo.
We jump from flower to flower so bright,
Desperate for a little light.
But if you made it to this line,
And read the words of my design,
Congratulations are in store,
You’re focused better than before.
You represent the hope we keep,
While all the others fall asleep.
So wear your badge, hold up your head,
You read the things the poet said!
Now go and scroll, you’ve earned the right,
To doom-scroll deep into the night.
But remember when you’re feeling hazy,
It’s not just you; the world is crazy.