When did I become a circus lion
Performing just to receive your praise?
It is just an illusion, a practiced act,
And now the dead you think you can raise.

I've done everything you tell me to.
I've been all you tell me to be.
I've put on this show for you.
Won't you please just set me free?

The cage can't contain my hostile spirit.
This costume is harsh on my scars.
I can't spend one more day forcing joviance.
I need to be free of these bars.

Where does truth begin?
In a act of honor,
sacrificing yourself for judgment.
Letting them know,
that your not okay.
Caving in,
confessing wrongs.
Telling that person,
you still love them.

How others react when all goes to hell
So much about their character does tell.
How they act when things are going well though
Much more of their true character does show.
How one interacts daily with others
Of their character is a true measure.

The closet in the dim isolated room
Stores away so many of my bones
That store too many secrets for the
Weak hearted,
So each week I’m parted from demons
That are a part of too much of me.

But I can never see the difference, my two sides won’t show it.
It does so little to comfort me; what have I become?
Am I the walking dead and a watcher of the funeral of my smiles,
Whose continuous lives and illness discomfort and confuse all?
Am I fast asleep when dreams of a peaceful life take over?
Because I awake to find that I’m too stripped back and empty to find anything to give,
A signal I care, or knowing something has shifted
A tectonic plate in my brain,
Erupting the series of footsteps to the door
Of the insane, knocking furiously enough to break it.

The desperate pull of the veil over my mind
Disguises it as curtains for a show, a grand act.
I am the star of the leading role, too centred, too vain,
Perfect to match the unmatched mess I feel every day.
The genius illusion is that am I really acting?
Even I do not know.
The stage is my war zone; no man’s land,
Because I am obviously not human,
And I cannot let anyone else in.
It's bad comedy of a pathetic attempt at drama
For anyone willing to tolerate my oh so called woes.
I choke on the mixture of laughter and tears
I collect in a cracking overflowing jar and drink,
Getting intoxicated on my pity, and hazy on the self-mocking,
Gurgling manipulations of sharing the side dish
But also shoving away any takers.
I am greedy - I want it all to myself.

And to myself it shall remain.
I buy all the tickets and keep them to remind myself
How my dim isolated room shrinks with each entry,
How I refuse to give out any more keys.
Maybe the walking dead is what I am;
Surely life is not this lightless when it is lived.
At least I hope not.

How strange, a man who could choose to love, but hated instead. Himself most of all. What a pity it was, but that's not what he wanted, right?
He wanted their forgiveness, not their pity. Forgiveness for not being enough. But they thought they saw right through him, they know his ways. And he would agree.
   He's a writer after all, he would say. It's in his nature to dislike himself to the point of ignorance. But when does an act become nature? When does this character he has created become apart of who he is? Or was it that way all along?