Pinocchio Politics

 Once upon a time...

We forgot
What we were supposed to remember
We remembered
What wisdom would have us forget

Still

Today
The instinct to survive
Keeps alive the will to live
Even if by childish means

Recall haunts us
While we forestall the pin prick
Choosing instead
The frog awaiting to princify
The Cinderella forever believing
Even as the stroke of midnight
Remains a formidable foe

For those in most pain
The starlit sky never fades
Continually lighting childhood fantasies
And unlike a simple sobering up
Stays determined to maintain false reality
Delusion's forever nirvana

Some say

We avoided the truth
Like an aging civilization of Pinocchios
Not trusting veracity could make us real enough
To know right from wrong
Love from hate

We missed hearing our own lies
And our noses grew
Becoming our major telltale reality
Eventually obstructing our vision
Blinding the discovery of who we unknowingly were

Our world remained
A childhood phantasm
And we were scared

We are scared

Like the fear of a Hollywood monster
We huddle together beneath false bravery's tinsel shells
Move about the world en masse
Never accepting how like the toymaker's soldering touch
Warmth's innocence inevitably solidifies
Melding permanent the acquiescence
Once independent

Still

We wander about
Having forged our shields such
That understanding one another
Has become a fantasy of another kind

We remain frightened

Like a wandering planet of fairytale characters
Fear playing the puppeteer
Holding tight our strings
Dreading courage might overcome
Paralyzing loneliness
We continue to drift
Never embracing fright
As a friendly awareness

And so...

The creative spirit continues reflecting life's reality
That metaphoric balance of thought
Where dreams walk beside trepidation
Knowing alarm be but the careful hand of caution
Reminding us life unfolds but once
Filling pages with experience
That can't be edited or rewritten
Becoming your book
My book
Our book that will end its story
Hoping we stop the lying
Read ourselves
And let the Geppetto of our life
Teach us something

For like a child
Clinging to a favorite fairytale
Our adult side also knows down deep
So much seeming unreal
Might be made to Be
If we'll be but careful
And honest

Oh so honest