My body is a topiary.
A beautiful illusion on the outside,
Tangled, twisted, rough within.
I will never escape this maze,
Of emotion and flesh.
Or change my man made shape.
There is a thick layer of bark that is my skin,
It itches me like sandpaper shingles.
I will start my life in adolescence,
Unaware of reality, innocent.
One day I will skip with joy, and fall with sorrow,
When the curtain opens and I meet the ugly world.
Then old age hits and,
I can only hobble, hunched over.
My body is a topiary,
Growing, shrinking, withering.
With my failing heart my life will lay still,
Like a cinder block, never moving stiff,
As someone carries it to it’s resting place.
Nothing will ever rustle in these
tangled branches again.
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