Self-Enslavement

Digging a hole
  to hide from the sky
A long, dark tunnel
    away from the lie
    turning away
but not leaving it behind.

Digging a moat
  between you and your soul
  the no-man's-land
  between perception and reality
  you shave off the icing,
      shed the trappings,
           strip off the tags,
                 scour your serial number,
but you can't quite manage
that last, final step.
The final vow to yourself
never again!
The first commitment
to truth and self-thought..

Truth asks too much....

So you blaspheme
    a decadent luxury
an inverted prayer -
the atheistic sacrament
The black masque
    you wear over your god-shaped hate
A testament to your fear
of yourself and those around you
your contempt
   for those who make their opinions known
   of those who
   struggle to reach up and touch the sky


You just can't kick the habit.

Empathy and self-examination
overridden by personal need
   a silent death
   of no concequence
   just the surge of superiority;
       community and
       collective spirit
           laughing at the strawman
       accepting defeat
          surrender into bliss
       bound to the rock
       [by your own hand]
           so you never have to try
           then you call yourself free
    the perfect cure,
       the perscribed poison
The dose aligned
to fill the void
to ease your chained, stiff wings,
to numb the chafing on your wrists,
    bloody and raw

A Slave,
   [by your own hand]
A Slave,
    to your own fear
       and communal apathy
A Slave,
    a child of wrath.


        Self-Enslavement:
        is digging a hole
        for your faith and
        your hate


        Buried...

        Supressed...
        but not abandoned.

        Just replaced.