Television Writer's Guild of America

A pair of spectacles rests on the table.
Alone, for the table has been cleared,
by the men whom everybody knows,
but no one recognizes.

The men who talk to a million people,
without saying a single word.
The men who numb our minds,
change our world,
or broaden our horizons,
depending on how you see them.

How would you feel?
You make millions of people laugh,
then you make them think,
use the pen to carve out their feelings,
their emotions are your ink.

They are on every screen,
every table, every conversation.
Yet they get no more than a penny
for their thoughts,
because they are not the ones
'people pay to see'.

No one waits after the climax,
the screen flickers off.
The true celebrities are lost
in a line of credits.

Everybody knows them,
but no one recognizes them,
until they have cleared their tables,
and all that's left is blank screens
in a million homes.