Take yourself. Your beautiful Self.
That premolded Self of you.
The You that everyone wanted you to be. And you are.
You are that perfect idea, on the outside.

On the inside, a prisoner pounding on stone walls.
****** knuckles and soot in your eyes.
For years that same person has pounded on those same walls.
Begging to get out.

Begging to take the place of that stranger, on the outside.
The prisoner sits in the ashes. Alone in the dark.
Until one day you hear the faintest chirp.
You ignore it.

Years pass by and you hear it chirping again.
Once more, the prisoner ignores.
It is hopeless.

For the final time, you hear the chirping.
This time it is different. It is much louder.
The chirping becomes almost deafening.

Finally the prisoner looks up.
What you see, you never could’ve imagined.
It was the brightest light.

So bright, it burned your eyes to gaze upon it.
Instinct told you to look away but staring felt like your only option.
The longer you looked, the less it burned.

Even through the soot in your eyes, everything became clearer.
You realized something that day.

That maybe this wasn’t a prison, at all.
It was just the bottom of a well.
You merely had to look up.

Freedom was that simple.

So, you climbed those stone walls.
As you got nearer to the top, your climb became easier.
Until you found yourself climbing the rungs of a ladder.
Finally, you reach the top.

No ****** knuckles.
No soot in your eyes.

You search for the impostor on the outside.
But they’re already gone.
It’s only you now.

As free as that chirping bird you once heard, in your prison.