3.03.2012

The Exxon PepsiCo Doritos Lorax

I am the Exxon PepsiCo Doritos Lorax, I once spoke for the trees...

Now I shill for corporations to generate licensing fees...

It all started way back before the cowboy actors time,
when my creator penned the very first green rhyme,
But spin doctors and liars were finely honing their craft,
and figuring better ways to make money than graft,
Before political discourse got so far off the track,
Ahhh, such a long, long, long, long, long time back...

Hollywood moguls discovered the money to be made,
from wringing every drop from children’s classics to make green colored ade.
Irony cannot be allowed to impede valuable product placement,
no matter how great the degree of my message’s debasement,

And so my simple message of ecological stewardship has been re-imagined and redrawn,
you know, kinda like if I’d sold away my soul and liked watching smog obscure the dawn,
Though to be played by DeVito as a crazed dervish certainly blows,
it could have been much, much, much, much worse, I suppose,
Good thing the casting for this one from the others did vary,
Cause at least I was sparred the indignity of being portrayed by Jim Carey.

I’ve nothing against recycling, that much is certainly true,
but high concept rehashing and rebooting leaves nothing on which a child's mind can chew,
Suits devoid of ideas that can be called their own,
slap a endearing old label on crap that my master would surely disown.
Old Once-ler once erred making so many thneeds,
but it's still not as bad as all these lame ripoffs that simply nobody, nobody, nobody needs.

"I am the Lorax. I once spoke for the trees.
I spoke for the trees, for the trees have no tongues.
Not having Scalia, Roberts, and Thomas to grant personhood to them,
Now against corporate axes their fates looks quite grim.
Withe the rich and the powerful controlling all discussion,
once again this land quakes under their unregulated machine’s percussion.

This shirt from my sponsors I am required to wear,
That it fits not at all they really don’t care,
For it must, must, must, must not be allowed, no, no, No!
a single square centimeter of flesh absent a corporate logo.
And my sponsors forbid me with the reapers to argue, or to even get mad,
They hope that concern for the planet was just an unfortunate fad.

My neocon handlers hated my liberal bent,
and trotted off to the sponsors, their bile to vent,
Angry conservatives night and day yelled, "Now listen here, Dad!
All you do is yap-yap and say, 'Bad! Bad! Bad! Bad!'
Well, we purchased your rights, sir, and I'm telling you,
you better start doing just what we tell you to do!”

They threatened me with lawyers and repercussions should I force them to sue,
It gave me some pause, I don’t mind telling you,
Then I remembered what my creator had intended, what even little children once knew,
I looked at the damage corporate greed would on this world imbue,
Then into the trash this silly-assed shirt I threw, threw, threw, threw,
and heisted my self up and away telling the corporations F You!












I am the Lorax, once again, I speak for the trees,

and the birds, and the sky, the water and bees,
So though now money is speech,
and has extended a company's political reach,
Don't you forget what the Once-lers ignore while they covet each penny,
We the people control their cash flow, and our voices are many,
Why not join me in remembering a time when we cared,
Tis the year of an election, what better time for our vision, with this country to be shared...

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

"Well, we purchased your rights, sir..."

This really says it all. It brought to mind the debasing compromise between artist and "benefactor." The chasm that money necessarily tears between ware and intent can never be healed. No kind of fundamental understanding between creator and consumer could ever be fostered to prevent such perspectival difference.

Pliny-the-in-Between said...

I'm stuck in character, so I must this way respond,
of this style of interplay, I am very very fond,
I agree with him to a point and am not looking for a fight,
so let paraphrase what Harry said in this way if I might:


So said the Pharisee,
by the dawns early light,
as he proudly declared
that a void between artist and consumer would always be there

Saint Brian the Godless said...

Kyoot!