they are infinite in number

from our most frightening childhood dreams
to terrible nightmares in our later years
born from guilt, disillusionment, trauma, shame

they glare at us all of a sudden

apropos nothing they flash into our minds
disrupt what little peace we may have found
in our busy lives

when they arise from their sealed chambers
undo the locks we put on them
    to keep them quiet and remote

we have to face them
    eye to dreadful eye
    face to frightening face

then   gradually

    surprise

the closer our  stare
the more we are aware
that all these faces share
what we find hard to recognize

they look
    quite disconcertingly
like us

maybe we should
    rather than banish them away
acknowledge them  as what they are

the different facets of our selves
that we present to our world
from day to day

No matter how shattered our homes were
or how many times throughout the night we heard our own cries,
we all started off with a grin stretching over our faces
with wide eyes staring at the sapphire sky and the emerald trees,
curiosity always singing lullabies in our ears.
But eventually,
the sky turns to rust and the tree's leaves fall off
and we are left to wonder where we went wrong
and how we got to the edge of the world,
looking down a sempiternal pit of blank faces,
including your own.
And as we grew our hands became rougher
while others got smoother,
so with the same wide eyes
we gaze up at the people who we praised,
for climbing down the border of the earth
wondering how they fell into the world
and climbed off of it into their mind,
and it was only till now that we realized,
separate people conquer different insanities.