Every Man and Every Woman

Don't be fooled by me.

Don't be fooled by the face I wear.

For I wear a thousand masks, masks that I am

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 am secure,

that all is sunny and unruffled with me,

within as well as without, that confidence

is my name and coolness my game;

that the waters are calm and I am

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,

ever-varying and ever - concealing

'Neath this lies no complacence.

Beneath dwells the real me in confusion,

in fear, and aloneness. But I hide this.

I don't want anybody to know.

I panic at the thought of my weakness

and fear of being exposed. That is 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 is followed by acceptance,

if it is followed by love. It is the

only thing that will assure

me of what I can't assure myself,

that I am worth something.

~~~  

But, I don't tell you this. I don't dare. I am afraid to.

I am afraid your glance will not be followed by

acceptance and love. I am afraid you will think

less of me, that you will laugh at me,

and that you will see this and reject me.

So I play my game, my desperate game,

with a facade of assurance without,

and a trembling child within. And so begins the

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 is really nothing,

and nothing of what is everything,

of what is crying within me;

So when I am going through my routine do

not be fooled by what I am saying.

Please listen carefully and try to hear

what I am not saying.

What I would like to be able to say,

what for survival I need to say,

but I can't say.

~~~  

I dislike hiding, Honestly!

I dislike the superficial game I am playing,

the phony game. I would really like to

be genuine and spontaneous, and me,

but you have got to help me. You have got to

hold out your hand, even when that

is the last thing I seem to want.

Only you can wipe away from my eyes that

blank stare of breathing death.

Only you can call me into aliveness.

Each time you try to understand and because

you really care, my heart begins to

grow wings, very small wings,

very feeble 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 the

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

shadowworld of panic and uncertainty;

~~~

From my lonely person.

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 me,

the blinder I strike back. I fight against the

very thing I cry out for. But I am told that

love is stronger than walls, and in this lies my 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 know very well.

For I am every man you meet and
I am every woman you meet

By Charles C. Finn

~~~

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