My Borrowed Face

I stormed heaven for an answer.
There judges convinced me
to trade my face for another's
by pretending to be
what I thought God wanted.
It seemed the thing to do.

Later I saw my borrowed face
in a mirror, alternately accusing
or defending me, so I tore it off.
Underneath
was a sucking darkness,
abject visceral terror of a void
comprised of everything not me,
as if my brain were caught
inside a photographic negative
like an anti-brain.

Since then my defenses haven't been too good.
Sometimes I feel like a popsicle in the sun
insensible to melting, content to sing
about my glorious evaporation
into an orange sugar stain
left behind like a poem.

Copyright © C.E Chaffin

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