Grimace. The child can't be older then five, but you feel his chilling glare.
Your bones buckle beneath you, one leg at a time.
The slow climb, how dare you.
The last of the month, the boy is masked, the girl is prepared for marriage.
Surreal, though you're in costume. Clad in cotton.
Flush, you begin to tear. Fight it.
Fight it.
You're disguised, the little ones stare through your shroud of secrecy.
They see how your heavy heart beats irregularly.
Only, if you had a hand to hold. You're ashamed for trying to kid them.
Before you can tear your clothing off, time stops,
the children have gone.
You stand alone in the darkest depths of the park.
Feral in fur, drooling and snorting.
Intoxicated by the night air, the stranger with orange skin in underwear.
You cower in fear, the hollow hole of conversation, the repetition.
Hidden,
There is no rationalizing your current state of affairs.
You have made the body and the mind separate entities,
a conflict of interest.
Scratching at intangible boundaries, trying to break free.
The innocent see this,
though the others ignore.