Masque/rade / poem by John RC Potter





Masque/rade 



You danced your dance, and sang your song: Masque…
Just a dancer from the dance; a singer with just one song: Masquerade…
Leaving me spellbound with your dancing. Eyes that captivate and are entrancing. 

Blue eyes so deep and so cold/looking like a glacial lake/telling me they never give more than you can ever take. 
Blond hair so golden and so bright/equated with the equatorial sun/speaking to me of how you turn away from what you’ve always done. 
Red lips so thin and so very dry, an elastic stretched much too far/showing me when I’m up too close just who and what you really are. 
You wear this mask of your own, yet you dare to call it a face/Then smiling I see the real you
but it’s gone without a trace. 

Is it so very easy to deceive and to be steeped in such subterfuge? 
Can a liar take shelter from the storm to find a place of relief and refuge?

For whom do you churn out these lies? You must know it was not done for me. 
Your lies convince you and you alone. I have vision whereas you merely see. 

You find it comforting to fool yourself so that you can walk on the wild side.
You have your mask and stories in place; where you walk is where you also lied.

Your multiple facades and quaint masquerades. 
Created for your gods, on the darkened esplanades. 
Loving the many nods and he who applauds. 
Belonging more to the bawds, rather than to empty accolades: 
Masque/rade






John RC Potter is an international educator from Canada, living in Istanbul. He has experienced a revolution (Indonesia), air strikes (Israel), earthquakes (Turkey), boredom (UAE), and blinding snow blizzards (Canada), the last being the subject of his story, “Snowbound in the House of God” (Memoirist). Recent prose publications include “Letter from Istanbul” (The Montreal Review) & “A Day in May 1965” (Erato Magazine); recent poetry publications include “From Vaisler Brothers to Tel Aviv” (New English Review”) & “Chiaroscuro” (Strangers and Karma Magazine). The author’s story, “Ruth’s World” (Fiction on the Web) was a Pushcart Prize nominee. His gay-themed children's picture book, The First Adventures of Walli and Magoo, is scheduled for publication.
Twitter: https://twitter.com/JohnRCPotter
Instagram: John RC Potter (@jp_ist) 

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