masks

Posted on May 10, 2012 by Susan L Daniels

The me
that is really not me
encounters you
that is not you

2 masks dancing
together
could become the us
we should be

tumbling in air
& sketching
on sky

Unknown's avatar

About Susan L Daniels

I am a firm believer that politics are personal, that faith is expressed through action, and that life is something that must be loved and lived authentically--or why bother with any of it?
This entry was posted in New Free Verse and tagged , , . Bookmark the permalink.

9 Responses to masks

  1. Noel Ihebuzor's avatar Noel Ihebuzor says:
    May 10, 2012 at 7:31 pm

    masks slowly unpeeled and and the joys of mutual discovery!

    • Susan L Daniels's avatar Susan L Daniels says:
      May 10, 2012 at 7:35 pm

      I had fun with these pronouns–why does this muse always whisper ideas like this in my ear as I am driving the car? I came rushing in the house with my coffee & wrote it down 🙂

    • Susan L Daniels's avatar Susan L Daniels says:
      May 10, 2012 at 7:40 pm

      I do so prefer to use mask rather than persona (since I can never remember the cursed plural form of persona anyway…..)

  2. Mr. Walker's avatar Mr. Walker says:
    May 11, 2012 at 1:27 pm

    Susan, I like where you took the idea of masks in the second stanza, and that last stanza – just wonderful imagery.

    Richard

  3. thecavesofaltamira's avatar Jeremy Nathan Marks says:
    May 12, 2012 at 1:19 am

    There is so much to think about and respond to in all of your poems. Where to begin?

    This one jumped out at me because of the first stanza. I thought of a fascinating short piece by Jorge Luis Borges entitled “Borges and I.” The mystery of it is in that first verse “The me/ that is really not me.” It also makes me think of a line I used to use on my mother when I was child. I would do something I knew that I wasn’t supposed to and yet I couldn’t resist temptation. She’d ask me why I did it and I would answer (and I remember doing this) “My mind tells me to.” And yet I knew, even then, that this was not exactly true. So, maybe it was “The me/ that is not really me.”

    • Susan L Daniels's avatar Susan L Daniels says:
      May 12, 2012 at 1:28 am

      Jeremy–I love it! I was playing with the idea of mask/persona in poetry–which to me is a lot of hooey–I am the voice in every phrase that begins with I–but it got me thinking about that other “I” in my poetry, and what she would do with the “you” in my poetry if she could. 🙂

Comments are closed.