(A thought for the new year)

I’d so often tried to be
The sort “they” thought I ought to be.
To wear the clothes, the face, the fit
To wow the crowds, to be a hit.
Yet hidden deep beneath it all
My hidden self began to call

“Now let me out, don’t be a fake!
Just let me fully life partake!
Open the window of your soul
For good or ill ‘twill make you whole”.

Hand shook and thumbled with the catch,
My inner being to unlatch.
Flung wide the door to let them see
That thing that was the inner me.

To my surprise and not alarm
They looked within serene and calm,
Embraced the inner me with love
Became connected far above
Those former shallow futile links
I’d made with “friends” all full of kinks.

The sun comes down upon me now
The art of living? I’ve…