The Happy Few
Mask.
Hidden,
Behind.
Emotions,
Cloud the holes,
Where eyes look.
Condensation,
Blocking windows,
Forming the mask,
To hide behind.
Hiding where it’s safe,
The room in the mind,
Guarded by the mask,
Skills to hide anger,
Skills I learned too young.
The mask is a liar,
The lies harmless at first,
Lies to yourself and them,
A survival tactic,
To stay hidden away,
Like dad always wanted.
The lies get worse in the mirror,
The mask starts to show it’s cracks,
Your eyes open up to you,
And you don’t know what you see.
When living with masks and lies,
The truth is malleable,
And trust is a scarcity.
We all can believe what we want,
We are bombarded with half-truths,
We are surrounded by strangers,
We are lured by false promises.
Why would I not seek protection,
Why would I risk a broken heart,
Why would I want to be perceived,
When anonymity is safe.
Another felled victim to masking,
Believing that hiding was helping,
Convinced that the world would be better,
If we stopped and stayed behind the mask.
The mask is what the people wanted,
Masking emotions I could not grasp,
When I would look in the mirror, I’d ask,
“What is it that others see in me?”
And surrender hope for an answer.
Only the mask remains as my outcome,
My own consequence for learning to run,
From anyone and anything combined,
But you can’t cage a lion forever,
The mask slips as you try to recover,
To save your placement in society,
Where we’re tricked by capitalistic masks,
Promising the truth through patronizing.
Know your mask well to integrate with them,
Or drop the charade with the happy few.
