People don't change
Their masks do

The ball begins.
Masks glisten in the faint light,
As we dance,
Our feet tap the marble.
Eyes meet,
Hearts run wild,
Masks cover,
The ball draws to a close,
We bow,
Drawing one final look into eyes of deceit,

Home we arrive,
Only to be confronted with,
A mirror,
The mask slips off,
We are not the mask,
The mask is us.

And so we hold on,
despite the heartache
we hold on.
Despite the pain
we hold on,
despite the scars
we hold on.
Despite the sadness, and loneliness and tears
we hold on.
Why do we hold on?

We hold on out of hope
that one day things will be okay
we hope.
For the person that we fell in love with to return
we hope
that the mask we fell in love with wasn't really a mask at all
we hope.
that maybe we didn't get ******* over
and that this will be the person who finally loves us for all that we are.

So we hold on to hope, despite it all
thinking maybe
this will be it.

The thing I wear when I’m depressed.
The thing I wear under stress.
When I’m angry I go to the mask’s caress.
I cradle my emotions in a nest.
Only to later have them thrown off my chest.
But still I go back to the mask’s concealing crest.

The mask’s magic is deceiving
It convinces me that hiding my emotions brings healing.
But listen now, listen don’t wait!
If wear the mask you will have it’s fate.
Sooner or Later and don’t forget,
The mask will make you do something you’ll regret.

Formed of muscle and sinew
A superficial existence
Confining and revealing an,
Enigma inside.

The roaring sound of applause is becoming too boisterous to bear.

A flock of cameras and video recorders begin to huddle at the corners of the platform set behind the curtains of the stage. Actors, dancers, stage crew, and all of those who smiled, slowly line up for the grand finale.

But not this girl.

This girl sits on top of the railing of the things that hold up the set. Waiting, seeking, and wistfully watching. An actress, without a doubt. One of the best, they say. Although this girl had no plans to take that step and accept gravity as her master and plummet to her death, she won’t deny that she hasn’t thought of that before. This time, she had other things on her mind. Something radical? Well, maybe. Spontaneous? She was too lazy to move. Dark and twisted? Not in that sense. Nonetheless, she was thinking of something with importance.

For instance, she was thinking about the homemade cookies her mother used to give her, if she behaved perfectly, quiet, and still. Since she loved the feeling of success and food in her stomach, she fought back the longing of playing games and having fun.“Too perfect a child”* some might say, but that never got into her. All she wanted was the sky, moon, stars, and nothing all at once.  

Years go by, mistakes are done, and nothing is made whole again. The girl is woven in a snare of lies and is drowning in a bathtub full of the blood of swine. She swims and floats and tries to escape the demons that haunt her very soul. Breathe in, breathe out. She continues to sit perfectly, quietly and still. Never talking, only listening, to the sounds of rules and rules and rules and rules and rules and rules that mess up her insides.

The girl performs an act that no one has ever seen. Taunting and terrifying, but beautiful and graceful all together.  The mask shows her perfection, the mask shows you nothing. Jump, then fall, tumble to the ground. Tick, tock, tick, tock, the sound as time goes by.

Tick
tock
tick
stop.


The roaring sound of applause from the demons in her head is becoming too boisterous to bear.

A flock of cameras and video recorders begin to huddle at the corners of the platform set at the unseen bottom of the pit. Actors, dancers, stage crew, and all of those who tell her, slowly line up for the grand finale.

*She takes that step.

He had blue skin
And so did she
She kept it hid
And so did he
They searched for blue
There whole life through
Then passed right by
And never knew
/gt

I saw her put a strange face on
same tint as her old skin
but so much harder
made to display fake affections
guarding her against
false friends
and dangerous heart intruders.

Her skin became plaster.
With each betrayal her heart hardened
as did her skin, flaking and brittling.
Till, angry and trembling
I saw it splinter and splatter
sprinkling sparkly brain matter
on the floor all around her.

Thus, the face that remained
was left disfigured and stained
a permanent portrait of the pain
she had been struggling against.