Invisible lives

A poetic attempt to describe existential paranoia and how you can never truly know anyone.

Every face with the smiles I know so well
Has hair and nose and shape and eyes,
That tell me to whom I speak. But beneath
The familiar and friendly façade, a hidden
Heart lurks with invisible desire, a hidden
Heart beating an unheard rhythm.
The heart, open or closed, escapes
That piercing glare of my paranoid
Eyes.

The words in their mouth, whether truth or lie,
Both are words the same.
The thoughts that move the tongue that makes them
Are more foreign than the bottom of the sea
And the roof of the sky.

The friendliest face can never be known.
All thoughts sinister, kind, sad, happy, selfish or wretched
Simmer beneath an unseen surface
Covered by a full-bodied lie.