Don't be fooled by me.  Don't be fooled by the face I wear.  I wear a mask.  I wear a thousand masks - masks that I am afraid to take off; and none of them is me.

Pretending is an art that is second nature to me, but don't be fooled.  I gave the impression that I am secure, that all is sunny and unruffled within me as well as without.

Beneath lies no smugness, no complacence.  Beneath dwells the real me in confusion, in fear, in aloneness.  But I hide that.  I don't want anybody to know it.  I panic at the thought of my weakness being exposed.  That's why I frantically create a mask to hide behind.

It's the only way I can liberate myself from my own self-built prison wall, from the barriers I so painstakingly erect.  It's the only thing that will assure me of what I can't assure myself - that I am really something.

But I don't tell you this.  I don't dare.  I'm afraid to.  I'm afraid your silence will not follow me with acceptance and love.  I'm afraid you'll think less of me, that you'll laugh, and your laugh will kill me; I'm afraid that deep down I'm nothing, that I’m just no good and that you’ll see this and reject me.

So I play my game, a 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.  My life becomes a front.  I idly chat with you in suave tones.  So when I am going through my routine, do not be fooled by what I am saying.

I dislike hiding honesty.  I dislike the superficial game I am playing, the superficial phony I am being.  I'd like to be really genuine and spontaneous and me.  But you've got to help me.  You've got to hold out your hand even when that is the last thing I need or want.  You can help wipe away from my eyes the blank stare of the breathing dead.  You can help call me into aliveness.  Each time you are kind and gentle and encouraging, each time you try to understand because you really care, my heart begins to grow wings, small wings, feeble wings but wings.

With your sensitivity and compassion 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 help re-shape the person that is me if you choose to.  PLEASE CHOOSE.  You can remove the mask, release me from my lonely prison; so please do not pass me by.  It will not be easy for you.  My long conviction of worthlessness builds strong walls.  I am irrational.  I fight, despite what books say about a person.

But I am told that love is stronger than the strongest walls, and in this lies hope.  Please try to beat down my wall with firm but gentle hands - for a young person is very sensitive, very fearful.

Who am I, you wonder?  I am someone you know very welt.  For I am every man, every woman you meet.  I am right in front of you.

Anonymous