If I asked you, truly, earnestly,

Pray tell what you’d reply

For I’ve witnessed each assurance,

Promise you’ll detoxify?

But you pledge to swear an oath

This time, plead guilty to desire

For a life on screen can only mean

You walk a thinning wire

You’re resigned to castigation

From the onset were condemned

To addictive connectivity

Soon made you comprehend

That the dopamine-fuelled pleasure

Where each hit could be your last

Drove each start anew, conviction true

Consign it to the past

I implore you, set me free

From reprehensible machines

Liberate me from temptation

The allure’s not what it seems

So if I now pose the question

Of what, perhaps, you’d do instead,

‘If I can’t doom-scroll, screw my eyes out -

As I’ll simply stay in bed!’