Social Media Sameness - Brand New Typewriter Series Poem

Typewriter Series #3097

@Insta_Repeat calling it out visually

Wrote this one quite awhile ago, there’s a truth for you right out of the gate. Wrote this one while scrolling through Instagram and TikTok and Pinterest and noticing something we’ve probably all noticed, probably always, but I just hadn’t really let my brain linger on it for long.

It’s all the same. All of it.

That’s what I noticed. I’ve noticed it while traveling too, everyone going to the exact same places to take the exact same photograph they’ve already seen of that place on social media. Everyone copying everyone else, following the exact same formulas, posting the exact same content. Every travel “influencer” wearing the same clothing, stopping in the same picturesque spots, taking the same photos.

Everyone talks about the same things, too, every #vanlifer posting the same slow-mo footage of pour-over coffee, wearing the same hipster hats, looking out of the same holes in the same tents they’ve seen others do 1000 times over. Everything, the same, and I worry sometimes that’s the enduring gift of the internets, some startling sameness where we all meet in the middle, stand in a circle and take turns taking the exact same photograph, then hopping into our carefully curated camper van and driving to the next spot. What then becomes of adventure?

That’s where this poem came from, a rare bit of snark from this mind of mine, as usually snark doesn’t show its face in my poetry unless it’s about politicians and their blowhard nonsense. Still though, sometimes it comes out, sometimes I just wanna say something and I long-ago realized I wasn’t born with guardrails on the highways of my mind. Here’s that.

I’m posting ALL new, never-before-read Typewriter Series poetry on this Signal Fire every single week. It’s a perk for the little paid community, a way to give access to all the poetry I’m still writing, as I no long post new things anywhere else, I’m staying far away from social media with my words. If you wanna support this place, keep it running, and get rad perks like first access to new poetry, live events (finally, Substack added this option!), writing prompts, and access to comments and our beautiful community, just click the button below:

Here now is the poem, and the audio version of it for those who wish to hear my silly voice read it aloud.

AND as per usual, the audio version so you can hear how my brain heard it the first time around:

I love you a billion. Thanks for keeping this place going, for reading these words.