Masks

image from thetuscankitchen.com

Masks

“The liberal state is a Mask, behind which there is no face;

it is a scaffolding behind which there is no building.”

--Benito Mussolini.

The face you wear at work          varies a bit

                      from lunch to board room,

                      from the handball court

                              (where you let your supervisor win)

               to the smarmy pithy views you share with Tess

                               (whose husband you went to college with)

                      around the water cooler.

The face you wear at the Credit Union

          as you ask for a personaL loan                 is quite different from

  the one you slip on for the plumber, or

                                      the waitress at Dixie’s, or

                                      the cop who pulled you over for failure

          to yield to a pedestrian in a crosswalk. or

                                       the crippled busker who blows mad mellow

trumpet near the farmer’s market, holding it low, head down,

eyes closed like Chet Baker, or

                                      the drunken Indian, reeking of Budweiser,

           on the beach below the reservation at Toholah, who appeared

                          out of the twilight half-shadows, asking for

                                  more beer or three dollars, who tells you

                          his name is Bear as he melts back into the darkness

            as you shovel angry sand onto the bright embers

of your dying fire.

There are several faces you have perfected even for

your wife, though certainly sometimes

she sees the real one,

                     raw, naked, vulnerable, intense & sensitive,

                     dripping with pain or joy, 

       and more than likely she recognizes You,        flickering past

partially mantled as one of a dozen guises, making

the shuffling sound as a part of a flip-animation notebook,

                     knows the difference, and

has conditioned her responses to each one.

Damn, just consider the face you present to

                                               your siblings,

                                               your parents,

                                               your children & grandchildren, or

                                                   your good friends--

                      each in turn completely relevant

           to who they think you are, or

               who you pretend to be, or

for a moment actually are;

                       for each of us are like the Chinese Mask performers

snapping new faces on instantly

as we turn our head,

or shift our gaze.             Decade standing upon decade,

                       we are all actors superbly playing many parts

like Alec Guiness or Peter Sellers, like Commedia participants

             allowed to wear any of the masks at will.

But while alone

shaving the face in the mirror, or

snipping nose hairs, or

brushing back gray locks

from our actual Face,                            moments elongate,

                         You hear the brakes screeching,

                                        the tires sliding, your vehicle 

out of your control,

as the rainbow scales fall away,

the bark peels back         & You are bathed in a stark realization

                          that one day soon, perhaps

                    even at that very moment, or another,

          without warning, blitzkrieg but brimming with

provocation, punishment & panache,

one day the paint becomes

too heavy for the wall

when you cover it up

so often--

                              & even though your hidden closets

                              & secret drawers are still overflowing

               with colorful lovingly-crafted masks, you find

          that some of them have crystalized    or disintegrated

                                                          or turned to bronze

                                                  or tin or putty or salt, &

You are left with fewer choices each morning.

Your actual Self              smiles defiantly, understanding

that it would soon usurp the folded hordes of imposters

you have habitually carried in your hidden pockets,

one for every occasion;    for in the end, skidding toward the veil,

there can be only one. 

 Glenn Buttkus

Posted over on d√erse Poets MTB

Today jousting as part of Team Brian

Would you like to hear the author read this poem to you?