Tuesday, September 9, 2008

Got My Yoga for Cynics Mask On...(Reflections From a Stagnant Pool #2)

It’s just Halloween.
I have my Bob Dylan mask on.
Bob Dylan Yeah everybody wear the mask but how long will it last.
Fugees

masks under masks under masks under masks
until I myself don’t know where they end
or begin, for that matter
or which mask is doing the thinking about it
or if there’s anything underneath at all
or if that’s a problem
or if it just requires a different perspective
from, perhaps, a different mask
as they all, it seems, turn different ways
some are cool like Bogart
others sputtering like Don Knotts
and all of them looking different to others than they do to me
so they all tell me that I’m laid-back
even happy-go-lucky
once, long ago, a close friend for years said she couldn’t imagine me angry
more recently someone I didn’t know so personally said I was so up-beat he couldn’t imagine me depressed or unhappy about anything
though I suspect that wily old coot may have known more than he let on
seeing through the masks and telling me through his own up-beat and genial mask that he wasn’t buying it
but what if those masks are actually the deeper ones?
what if rage and depression are merely layers of onion skin,
waiting to be sloughed off?

10 comments:

kw said...

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http://danomacnamarrah.blogspot.com/

Cheers, Dano.

Unknown said...

Who is to say?
Facial expression
Along with emotion
Evolved together
for so long
They are universal

ssgreylord said...

love it, love it, love it...
do you ever wonder which of the masks is really you? or maybe there is no you and you are just made up of the very many masks we choose to wear each day...does that mean we're in charge of who we are or does someone else out there choose our masks for us?
okay, getting strange now, must go...

Lana Gramlich said...

I order you to go play with puppies this instant!

Anonymous said...

A lass I'm friends with from my previous job who knew about what happened at the time of my assault... recently was given the URL of my blog to read. She's someone I trust.

Word for word, part of her reply to me was: "From the outside looking in, its hard to believe that you - such a fantastic charismatic girl could be dealing with such terrible emotional struggles."

Masks indeed. But I wonder sometimes, if they really do us more harm than good?

Did it really benefit me that very few people knew what turmoil I was going through?

I often wonder anyway...

Lydia said...

Deep, layers deep.

Gypsy at Heart said...

Contrary to what some might say, I've always believed that one cannot project what somehow exists inside of us to some varying degree. What mask one chooses to show on any given day is so much a mixture of everything that goes on around us and, like I said before, what we have inside. Notice I give "us" the mask wearer, some credit in the choosing. Hence I agree with the old coot and suspect that he was entirely right in seeing that there is more to you than the masks.

white rabbit said...

Best not to wear that mask outdoors...

I've a canny idea how the police would react.

Wonder Man said...

masks are the best defense from the truth, just ask McCain

Anonymous said...

"There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;
There will be time to murder and create,
And time for all the works and days of hands"
T. S. Eliot