Masks

Recently I have had a lot of time to think about the various masks put on by humans. Each of us presents a different facade to different people, making it challenging to truly understand someone. Right now, I am at a stage where many things in my life are going wrong because of a version of me that existed and is now indigestible for my world. The question that keeps coming my way is, why that mask? Why put it on in the first place?

The truth is, masks make us feel safe even when they get suffocating and unbearable. They are like a shield that makes one feel stronger even if its an extra weight we are dragging around. I know my mask makes you feel frustrated and disconnected. Yet, I wonder, why is vulnerability something you seek in me but hesitate to show me in return?

Every time my heart cracks a little, I learn a little bit more about love. I used to associate love with familiarity and similarities, but now I see it differently. Love isn't about drowning in guilt and fear; it's about the absence of embarrassment between two people. It's about not having to convince yourself that this is all it would ever be. It is not having to be afraid to speak up. It is about being yourself without trying to be what the other person would like. 

All the books and poems talk about how love is blind and how you overlook the flaws of the one you love. I don't really think it's true. I believe love magnifies flaws, making actions and words more hurtful and intentions more questionable. 

So I don't think I just want to be loved. I want to be understood. Which is in itself an herculean task because I dont even understand myself, how will somebody else? But that's what I want. 

Anyone can fall in love with you if you are around long enough. 'I love you' is losing it charm for me. It's so much crammed into goodbyes that hearing it almost makes me unhappy. I dont want the empty, tasteless three words. 

I want to crawl inside someone's skin, underneath their ribs and hold their heart in my palm. I want my soul carved into their beating heart. I want someone who I don't have to fear showing myself too. Who will see me for who I am and come closer. Someone who is as wretched as I am but will still chase the burning sun with me. Somone who will walk closer every time I take a step back out of fear.

Anyone can and will love me. What I want is to find my safety in them and not my mask. To understand and be understood. Anyone can hold me, but I want to be unmasked. 

Somone who won't drown in the depths of me. 


-Butterfly

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