Fakeness Renewed

I wander
aimlessly
through this masquerade ball.
silks of splendor
and elegance
swirling
and twirling
at the feet of the crowd.
fancy airs
and idle chit-chat
drift through my head.
my eyes,
vision dimmed
and closed in,
by this classy mask,
search,
seek out a friend.
I catch sight of you,
my closest companion,
my sister.
not by blood,
but by trust.
I journey nearer,
weaving in and out,
and in and out,
and in and out
of all my plastic peers.
I stand beside you,
but I'm shocked,
appalled
to hear the filth
spilling,
pouring forth
from your mouth.
about me,
all of it.
you make me seem so vile,
so disgusting,
so,
so unlike me.
suddenly,
you turn to me
and I realize that you hold no mask,
unlike all others.
an epiphany
resounds in my brain.
this is your mask.
your colorful lie for me.
it's not you.
not the you I know,
not the you I trust,
not the you I hold dear.
so,
so you lied
to me.
in disbelief
up I reach,
to remove this fatal front.
you strike me down,
time and time again.
finally,
my hand,
it touches this face of yours.
I rip,
I tear,
I split,
this mask,
this front
from your flesh.
but alas,
this is not your only mask.
more and more images I see,
but of course,
not all for me.
each mask a different face,
for a different friendship,
a different place.
one by one
your facades slip
from the tears shining in your eyes.
each plummets
and plummets
and plummets
toward the extravagantly
decorated floor.
and with a loud
crash,
they are no more.
each face,
each mask,
each more hideous than the last.
abhorrence and lies
contort
these twisted mortals.
at last,
at long last,
the final mask.
you grasp that mask with all your might
and wrench it from your being.
I grimace and wait,
expecting the worst,
the very worst.
but,
I see instead,
a hurt little girl,
on her shoulders,
the weight of the world.
these facades,
these masks,
these masquerades,
simply her way of covering
for feelings she can't control.
she lost it somewhere
along the line
she used to walk.
these fronts
and images,
they were just her means
to cover up the way she truly felt.
they were her shield
to protect
what she had left
of her broken, bleeding heart.
and you,
how are you one to blame?
for we all have our masks,
our images,
our fronts
and masquerades.
we put them up,
afraid to let them in,
afraid to let them see,
afraid to make them share in this pain.
please,
don't be afraid
to strip down to you.
only you.
be honest
with the words you say.
be honest
with the things you do.
and those masks,
one by one will crash onto the lavish décor.
I can't promise you no pain,
for I know,
those fronts are burned,
branded,
seared into your very soul.
but that pain,
that pain,
it's the pain
that helps you start again,
as you.
so take a step
or make a choice.
will you still be a part of the plastics,
the reproduction of the true you?
or will you come to terms
with the things of your past
and begin,
begin to remove those masks?