“Confront the facts!
You’ve hated yourself,
You’ve lived a lie!
You’re not what you present!”
“Shut up.
All persona is presentation,
It’s all a lie anyway
So what does it matter?”
“Represent someone else
And hide from what you really feel.
Is this what you really want,
Miss Freedom of Expression?”
“I’ll express what I choose.
My secrets are my own,
And does anyone really care
What I feel inside?”
“What does it matter
If anyone gives a damn?
What satisfactions comes
From dishonest expression?”
Sometimes I feel better when I imagine my own conscious thought is all that exists.
The feeling of being a disembodied psyche in friction-less space,
Emptied of all but the most critical pieces of my identity
And reassembling my complexities into a more beautiful shape.
As many times as I’ve done this,
There are thoughts and patterns that persist through me,
Some I’ve cherished, others I’ve hated,
And some I couldn’t understand or even properly explain.
There are pieces that never seem to come unstuck,
Fears, attachments, and my deepest memories.
There are images and vague connections I retain,
Like pen-strokes which remain even after they’re scribbled over.
A vague, off-beat rhythm seems to drive my actions,
Unfocused or out of sync with the environment I’m in,
Curiosity, obsession, and paranoia distort my tempo,
Playing my own tune, in spite of what drums beat around me.
I’m liable to fall carelessly into the beautiful or intriguing.
My heart snaps alert, when a note, by happenstance, complements my own.
There are ideas, perceptions, and sequences of thought
That feel more like hell and like home than any real place.
Whatever I do or imagine myself to be,
There are elements of myself that remain true.
Burdens I carry, gifts likewise treasured,
And I expect they’ll remain until my mind is permanently changed.
DrearyAnn dressed her thoughts
In renaissance corsets and faux leather boots.
So much the better to envelop displeasure
And dissatisfaction from critical abuse.
Daydreamed hours drifted on vainly,
Vaguely insane, with morbid visions juxtaposed
More vivid and vibrant than others imagined,
So blatantly tragic in sadness predisposed.
Dreaming of dreaming of such things
As the darkest of a single dream ever saw.
Laced with lavish desires entwined
With desperate needs towering overall.
Draped in dreary phantasms galore,
Alone and on her back reposed,
Around her and over passer-bys step,
Unknowing or caring what fantasies formed below.
Judging value
In indiscriminate measure
Through the process
Of identifying constants
Amid variable personas.
Chaotic babble
Interwoven with emotions
Clouding personallities
In insepid debate
Signifying little.
Introspective hell
Latching onto safe platforms
Expressing the darkest depths
Of existential dread
In idle whispers.
Entertainment
Like an inconvenient memory
Signaling dire warnings
As questionable information
Presents itself in lace.
Daydreaming watchers
Wondering within access
On the possible implications
Of life on Mars
Or anywhere.
Complexity breeds
As simplifying destroys.
Any and all answers
Wither on
Or grow away.
