Don't be fooled by me.
Don't be fooled by the face I wear.
For I wear a mask, I wear a thousand masks.
Masks that I'm afraid to take off.
And none of them are me.
Pretending is an art that's second nature with me,
But don't be fooled, For God's sake don't be fooled.
I give the impression that I'm secure, that all is merry
And unruffled with me, within as well as without, that confidence
Is my name and coolness is my game; that the water's calm and
I'm in command and that I need no-one.
But don't believe me. Please.
My surface may seem smooth, but my surface is my mask.
My ever-varying and ever-concealing mask.
Beneath lies no smugness, no complacence.
Beneath lies the real me in confusion, in fear, in aloneness.
But I hide this. I don't want anyone to know it.
I panic at the thought of my weakness and fear being exposed.
That's why I frantically create a mask to hide behind.
A nonchalant, sophisticated facade, to help me pretend.
to shield me from the glance that knows.
But such a glance is precisely my salvation.
My only salvation,
And I know it.
That is, if it's followed by acceptance, if it's followed by love.
It's the only thing that can liberate me from myself.
From my own self-built prison walls, from the barriers that
I so painstakingly erect.
It's the only thing that can assure me of what I can't assure
Myself - that I'm really worth something. But I don't tell you this.
I don't dare to. I'm afraid to.
I'm afraid that your glance will not be followed by acceptance,
And love.
I'm afraid that you'll think less of me, that you'll laugh at me.
And your laugh will kill me. I'm afraid that deep down
I'm nothing, that I'm just no good and that you will see this
And reject me.
So I play my game, my desperate pretending game,
With a facade of assurance without and a trembling child within.
And so begins the parade of masks, the glittering but empty
Parade of masks.
And my life becomes a front.
I idly chatter to you in the suave tones of surface talk.
I tell you everything that's really nothing.
And nothing of what's everything,
Of what's crying within me.
So when I'm going through my routine,
Don't be fooled by what I'm saying,
Please listen carefully to what I'm not saying,
What for survival I need to say but what I can't say.
I dislike hiding. Honestly. I dislike the superficial game
I'm playing - the superficial, phoney game.
I'd really like to be genuine and spontaneous.
Just me, but you've got to help me.
You've got to hold out your hand even when that's the last thing
I seem to want or need, or that you feel like doing.
Only you can wipe away from my eyes the blank stare of the
Breathing dead.
Only you can call me into aliveness.
Each time you're kind and gentle and encouraging;
Each time you try to understand because you really care:
My heart begins to grow wings, very small wings, but wings.
With your sensitivity and sympathy and your power of understanding,
You can breathe life into me.
I want you to know that. I want you to know how important you
Are to me.
How you can be a creator of the person that is me -
If you choose to.
Please choose to.
You alone can break down the wall behind which I tremble;
You alone can remove my mask.
You alone can release me from my shadow world of panic and
Uncertainty, from my lonely prison.
So do not pass me by.
Please do not pass me by.
It will not be easy for you.
A long conviction of worthlessness builds strong walls.
The nearer you approach to me,
The blinder I may strike back.
It's irrational, but despite what the books say about man,
I am irrational.
I fight against the very thing I cry out for.
But I am told that love is stronger than strong walls.
And in this lies my hope.
My only hope.
Please try to beat down those walls with firm hands,
But with gentle hands.....
For a child is very sensitive.
Who am I?
You may wonder.
I am someone you may know very well.
For I am every man you meet,
And I am every woman you meet.