Tag Archive for Facade

The In-Between

There’s a time before sunrise

With quiet streets bathed in grey light

A time after dawn. Watch the world

Emerge from the chrysalis of the night

It’s a quiet time, the in-between time

It’s my time, the in-between time

With its in-between people

Some out too late, some up too early

Too tired to raise their walls

Shut out the world

Put on their masks

Or maybe they’re sharing, intentionally

This sliver of their life

This glimpse of their psyche

With

A cadre bound by being awake

Too early in the morning.

Masking in the Morning

Restricted absent cleansing approach

Aroma sheek mineral oils

Falter skeptic stress relief

In a conference of intergenerational

Exfoliation maneuvers

 

Colored contour interprets confidence

Embalmed for powderfresh comfort

Brush to naturalize the effect

Masquerade

The first note strikes to

the tune of deception,

The second note sung by deceit,

The musicians play on, a harmony of lies

As we rise to dance in the fraud,

Our steps—quick and light as evasion—

Echo with hollowness when set to the floor,

Waltzes of guile, forgery, falsehood,

Sweeping the room with polished distortion

When under the weight of our own self-destruction,

As the delicate melody draws to an end,

the dance floor beneath us crumbles and shatters.

Piercing egos in the stillness

 

This work received a Gold Award in The Scholastic Art & Writing Awards of 2002.

The Romanticized Star

Slinky, bright pink

bubble gum snapping

blond.

A head cocked back in

movie star laughter,

stained white laughter.

Leaning forward,

your designer sunglasses slide down your

purchased nose.

The toocoolforyou shades

quickly moved back.

Your trademark accessory,

or do you have world-fearing eyes,

deepdark eyes,

afraid of the burning light,

the scintillating light which sees right

through

you.

A porcelain hand emerges,

Barbie-pink nails,

now gliding through the

blondest of the blond.

My hand reflexively places itself

on my own hair,

and is caught up in curls,

a mass of auburn tangles.

My glance falls to the mirror

and my flawed self,

but my eyes prevail.

Bluegreen,

surrounded by cheap, ebony,

wet-n-wild lashes,

which can look straight at the world,

and not flinch.

Even without rose-tinted plastic.

Sad Eyes Look Ahead

These sad eyes, they look ahead

Into the dark nothingness, they stare

Without happiness or joy, they are emotionless.

Yet the smile shines brightly.

An illusion created to satisfy the questioning looks of others.

But not good enough to satisfy oneself.

The mind tries to hide what the heart feels.

The body laughs while the soul cries out.

Softly do the invisible tears fall.

Flowing deftly into the river of time.

So soon are they forgotten…

Speckles of dust lost in a great desert.

So am I lost—confused in each and every direction I turn.

No one can see my sadness… my grief—

No, no one truly can in my good conscience.

A Foreign Persona

I feel safe. I feel home. I feel right and accepted whenever my mind wanders back to that room. I feel magical, and I feel knowledgeable. I was a regular.

From January of my freshman year in high school through May of my senior year, I spent my afternoons in a wondrous place, where I left myself at the door. With possibility as my escort and faith as my companion, I dared to live a dream, which only I had the power to pursue. Just arriving at the door, I gained the incentive, the adrenaline rush. I wanted to be her. As I neared the front, swashbuckling through onlookers, I felt a certain privilege overcome me. I felt as though the world was watching and I had the future mapped out in my mind. Her fate had been memorized.

Behind the dark curtain, my family awaited me. Soon, we would all take on our alternate personalities to entertain the onlookers and to tell their stories. We had spent endless hours preparing for the next three days—not even three days: seventy-two hours—six of which would be crucial. But it didn’t matter. In just seventy-two brief hours, their lives would end and ours begin again, but it didn’t matter. The thrill and excitement would last a lifetime.

I never imagined I would find my safe haven in a place where I was forced to bare all; unveiling myself to dozens of strangers. I found comfort in the fact that I was not the one being exposed; however, it was my resolution to portray her as well as she may have done if given the opportunity to, herself. My mind, my own enemy, I cleared every thought which did not pertain to that exact instant, and allowed my imagination to run rampant, abandoning my fears and myself, taking on a foreign persona.

This seventy-two hour interval would occur three times a year for four years. I could never imagine what the last minute, of the last hour, of the last day, of the last year would bring with it. The time when the roles would be reversed and her life would go on, without me, leaving myself as my only companion. But, eventually, the day did come, and somehow I left her, alone behind the dark curtains with my family, hoping that someday we would be reintroduced for another six hours.

Pose

Look at me happy and held dear

Look again enraged by hate, denied by him,

I pose to hide my fear, to keep me cool and calm a tear,

But what comes from all my work, a simple falsehood

But then, nothing good.

 

Look at her, smiling and fresh,

Look again at her ripped flesh.

She poses only to ease your head, from what you know, and what you dread.

But what comes from all her work, a simple falsehood,

But then, nothing good.

 

Look at him, content in work, lost in thought, ready to start.

Look again at his mangled mind, his flaming eyes, his hardened heart.

He poses not to simplify life, but to keep his family from his strife.

But what comes from all his work, a simple falsehood,

But then, nothing good.

 

Look at us, all users of masks, we love the hate,

Look again we’re makers of evil, and dead as fate,

We pose to stop the pain inside but what comes of it…

Nothing good.

Rose

The lights are out

and the house is quiet as she slinks down the stairs.

You could never tell but by her haunted eyes what fear fills her mind;

and a way she has of looking over her shoulder,

cringing from shadows, touches, and people who aren’t there.

You could never tell from her stylish clothes or her prettily curled hair.

Her designer shoes wouldn’t give her away, or her outstanding grades.

Yet she walks like she’s expecting some sort of brutal blow.

Her eyes flick from yours, should you have the stomach to meet their fey sorrow.

The lights are out.

All her family sleeps as she creeps from her room.

The gentle night holds her close, keeps her face in shadow.

Delicate fingers shake as they reach to touch a rose,

running her finger across a silky petal, accidentally snagging on a thorn.

She whispers a quiet word to the patient, kindly night, an ancient question

as her finger bleeds. “Why?” and as always the night does not answer.

A petal falls, disturbed by her unsteady fingers, unable to cling to the stem any longer.

Silently another petal falls; a flower’s life is not so long as that of a woman.

Someone stirs and she flees to her room.

The night sighs, caresses her face as she slips into sleep.

You could never tell from her peaceful face that she is any different from you.