Miss-Tress: Concubine Chronicles 3

Hard Choices: Out of the Mouths...

He say he gon' leave her

But you know that dog lie!

She is his main stay;

I can't believe that I

Didn't notice it sooner.

Why couldn't I see?

Took him giving her a new house

For their 25th anniversary!

Lord! The time that I wasted

Like a donkey, a mule!

And it was there all along.

God, I've been a damn fool!

Still...

I don't know if I have it in me

To start over again.

I've burned so many bridges;

Lost that many friends.

And now I done hit rock bottom

Talkin' to you

But since it's already out there,

Might as well follow through.

So then...

What you think sweet baby,

What's yo' mama to do?

Funhouse Prism

 

Light shines in

And I go to pieces
In my cocoon 
Of swaddling fleeces.

Another day begins

And I'm so not ready.
I take a deep breath;
Try to keep my feet steady.

Don't tell me

That I'll just have to

Toughen up and take it

'Cause honestly

I don't have the strength

To fake it.

Another day has come

And I'm still on the run.

I'm just so tired of trying,

Trying just to make it.

Tell me what your secret is.

How d'you stop yourself from going crazy?
With force of character and sheer strength of will?
Or little purple pills maybe?

Is it just that you are

An actor extraordinaire?

Are you certified in make believe?

An architect of castles in the air?

Perhaps you are a master

of the art of slight?

Or are you yourself a kind of mirage

A warp inside my mind

Made visible by shifting shadows

Or some strange trick of the light?

Whatever your strategy
You pull it off so flawlessly
That I can't help but marvel at
The smoothness of the act.

Meanwhile I
Can't help but cry
While stuck inside this maze
Dreaming only of better days
When I'll not only see the sky
But take a leap of faith
And fly...

Divestment

It's time...

For all the years spent trying:

Be stalwart, be calm,

Patient and kind,

Yet ever armed;

Be wise and subtle,

Be firm and yet humble;

Be genuine but know how to fake,

Bend like the green willow but never break;

Never let them see behind your game face... 

All the while knowingly lying

For the sake of conforming

To social grace.

The walls I built with reinforced steel

Turned into a prison that would not yield

Even to my hand, 

When, at last a man,

I came to understand

That in weakness there can be strength

In awkwardness, stealth

And underneath poverty, untold wealth.

When at last I opened my eyes

Finally beginning to realise

That I'd read the signs wrong

That I'd been brainwashed all along

Into thinking I needed to kill

All the while amassing debt in an unpayable bill,

Keeping me enslaved, effacing my will;

Leaving me numb, soulless and ill

But demanding more and even more still...

So I decided

It's time:

Time to let go

Time to strip off all the masks and pretense and ego

Time to look into the mirror and finally know

What's really there so I can undergo

The metamorphosis that must inevitably follow...

Time to put all I've learnt to the test.

Time to come face to face with my best.

Time to be strong and leave fear powerless.  

Time to be vulnerable, not time to hide.

And at the edge of this decision, I cried.

Shameless...