often

Often

Too often when I am pensive
Too often when I sit alone
The world becomes nebulous indistinct

As the day drifts, flown by in a haze
Like sand through my fingers
And slipping clouds strained through the sky

Unspoken are the feelings I cloak
Veiled beneath a calm veneer
Folded in my confident façade

Too often I am disguised
Too often I do conceal
The cowering me behind the brave

I quail underneath
I shiver, I shake
Scarring inside, and inside,
I break

I am rooted, frozen, but
The world spins a breathless
Miasma a vertigo of chaos
Often, all too often

I play a part
A shadow behind a porcelain mask.