Pretense

Many times we as humans put a pretense face,

to hide what we are really feeling.

We are afraid to face the bitterness of love,

we use a pretense face of joy and laughter to cover what we feel.

But, someday even us, ourselves can’t deny our pretense is not good enough.



We gather all the strength in our hearts,

wishing for a better pretense to use,

so our emotions can remain buried in the depths of our heart.

For we fear if our pretense face breaks,

then we can’t help but run into the arms of the one we love,

falling into their arms, we will spill our soul and heart to them.



All we can do is gather up the strength in our hands,

like wet sand and use it to smear upon our faces,

to hide our true emotions that can sometimes be seen so easily.



Even when we write to someone,

we use a pretense to reassure and comfort them,

we are fine with it, we aren’t sad.

Yet, is that how our heart really feels?

Our pretense face can fool ourselves, others,

but can it fool our own heart?

Fool our heart and what it beats for?



We put upon our pretense face of happiness,

so the one who leaves us can feel assured we are okay.

Someday, when we think about it again,

we still force a pretense face smiling at it, even though it still hurts.



Bitter can turn into sweet, if we allow ourselves,

to run into the arms of the one we love and spill our mind.

But, we would rather stick with bittersweet,

for we are selfish like that.



We want it to be a bitter and still a sweet memory.

We don’t care how the other thinks,

we will keep our pretense face up, until the day they find true happiness.

We only stare from afar without a word,

so many times happiness brushed past us,

yet we haven’t the strength to make happiness stay,

to make happiness last forever by our side.



Let us stand alone with our pretense face,

a face that we know too well.

So well, that we can no longer discard like trash.

For it has been used too many times,

we can no longer discard it, for it has become one with us.



For a person who is special to our heart,

we no longer have the chance to run into their arms.

We lost to ourselves, to our hateful pretense face and to them.

It was a fair fight, it was our decision,

let us sleep forever in our selfish decision and pretense face.



When we chose to not run into their arms,

to let our pretense face remain, that was when there,

was no more turning back.

But, we do admit our pretense face is not good enough,

we faked through the world, through love, through life,

through everything, but we couldn’t fake our own emotions.



All those endless nights where we sit up in bed,

we stare at our reflection in the mirror at our pretense face.

We falsified all but our heart and emotions,

let us sit here forever like this…



Those arms we known so well,

no longer will be open wide for us,

all that embraces us is empty air,

for those arms are a comfort and embracing another.

We allowed that chance to slip through our fingers,

the day we allowed our pretense to take over us…



~Jae