Joyous Skin

Don't start a day like every other.

Are you awake?

It's time to wake up.

You don't want to be late to see the big, wide world out there, do you? Don't want to miss seeing your friends. Do you know them? Do they know you?

Do you know you?

Come on, hurry up! Don't be late! Brush your teeth, have a shower, skip your late breakfast. There's no time!

Put on your joyous skin. That way no-one will be scared or angry. No-one will reject you. Don't show yourself, that's not what people want to see. They want to see you smile when you see them, laugh at their jokes that you don't find funny, hang out with them and talk about things you don't care about. Never connecting, never happy. Become the carbon copy friend. Become the carbon copy Human.

Put on your skin, otherwise they'll miss you. Right? It's not like they have another carbon copy friend to laugh with, another one to talk about mundane s**t that's just there to fill the spaces with. They'll be scared to see who you really are, and so would you.

It's not just you, it's everyone else as well. From the kids getting wasted and f*****g on the park bench to the big boys upstairs sipping red wine and laughing at the boss's s****y limericks. God has forsaken us, and left us in charge.

And boy, did we f**k up badly.

The skin's stuck on and you can't lift it off, you've lost sight of yourself. You don't know who you are because you've spent so long shielding yourself from others so you wouldn't feel lonely. But now you're lonelier than ever, you don't even have yourself for company.

Just the skin.

Just the hollow, false sense of self.

Plaster on a smile and the world will smile back. Be happy, that way everyone else will be happy, too.

Remove the skin that corroded your true flesh and your true self when the sun goes down and you step away from the world. Are you still happy? No?! What a surprise!

Now there's just fear, anger, hatred. You've lost who you are and the others keep smiling at you. Looking like drones trapped with their own false skin.

Don't worry, be happy.

You're cold and alone in this big world and you have no idea what to do. And you're scared. Who you really are will scare the others, a scared little boy who's seen too much of this world in all its ugliness, all it's depravity, all it's corruption under it's own false skin for you to ever remain quiet about it. The skin latches on. That's when the anger comes. How dare they turn a blind eye to themselves? How dare they hide the fact that they are just animals in the deprived orgy of corruption and disarray, hidden under the grand façade of civilisation, morals and dominance? A deprived orgy, rolling in the vomit spewed forth from the Modern Human. Savouring the ejaculation of hatred and fear of change in their saw-toothed mouths. All under this skin.

Turn the hatred for your fellow man on them. They're not your fellow man, they allowed themselves to be controlled by the people around them. Show me yourself. Shed the skin. Are you still in there?

You can feel yourself underneath it all, not gone yet. Tear the skin off, show yourself! This is who you are, the pure Human, unchanged by anyone, unchanged by civilisation's boundaries.

Dark, primordial, complete. Beautiful.

Are you awake?

It's time to wake up.

Reviews

[Kamari's]

Very impressive with the turn at the end I love turning events

[jjwilbourne]

I love the way it turned at the end. The pulling off of skin.
This reminds me of life at 17 years old. I can feel the vibe.
Excellent work.

[Ashira Macy]

Wow this was intense. In a good way naturally, and I found myself agreeing with everything the speaker said. I think this has been my inner dialog on more than one occasion to be honest. At the beginning I expected it to be painfully upbeat and positive, so I was pleased to find how quickly it became realistic. Too often do we paste on those smiles lest we make anyone we don't know uncomfortable, because we measure our worth by what strangers think of us. Thank you for this, it was a fantastic read.

[SpeedyHobbit Armstrong]

You did a powerful job at conveying the theme of conformity and the struggles to fit in. There's a strong sense of anger and loneliness

"Put on your joyous skin. That way no-one will be scared or angry. No-one will reject you. Don't show yourself, that's not what people want to see. " This does a great job calling attention to how most people put on a mask when they go out to face the world.

[C. Rose]

Congratulations!
This piece is a finalist in Promote Me!V.
As your reward, I have sent 115 read requests on behalf of this piece.

Voting is open until 10/15/14.
http://www.writerscafe.org/contests/Promote-Me%21-V-%28Experimental%29/50315/
Good Luck!

[Emerald]

This is interesting and full of powerfully emotive concepts. The sense of outrage ratchets up gradually. Rebellious writing and very well written. Dramatic and relevant. I like the questions addressed to the reader. You reach out of the page and into our minds. Makes a person stop and think about themselves, about the way things are in the world. About what is false and what is real, if anything. And where is there someone who is more than just skin and lies who can show the way. Perhaps creative people are, or is creativity just beautiful and terrible lies as well? Your writing is very unusual- poetic and a bit like stream of consciousness. Have you read Jack Kerouac? You may enjoy reading some of his work.

[kendra14(:]

um im so confused? is this a poem? if its a story its amazing writing but a bit non story like? if its a poem its great but hard to identify if its a poem or not. its actually really great i just wouldnt have made the * things when you swore. just write the word or change the word it looks to texting like. but all in all good job(; oh and love the title so unique!

[T. Greyman]

There aren't any asterisks over the swear words, you must have put an age under 16 or 18 on your profile or something.
Anyway, to be honest, I'm not really sure what it is, either.
I just had a misanthropic relapse (LEL SO EDGY XD) and just wrote.