At some point choosing to be free
I realized
Meant choosing to be misunderstood
I couldn’t be free while being trapped
In the expectations
No, in my oversized concern about the expectations,
To perform Understandable Character
Not to audiences who only saw the staged performances
And didn’t care about the behind the scenes
The messy truth
Of hours of stage makeup
Required to hide open wounds
And old scars
There are very few people who I had let into my dressing room
And fewer still who had ever bothered
To turn on the light
Not their fault really,
I am skilled at playing
Pleasant
Understandable
Reliable
Nice
I have practiced hard
And been rewarded
And I am all too aware of the consequences
When you slip out of character
But some had seen
Some people had been in the dressing room
Lights fully on
Or even watched the injuries happen
And thought they knew the truth
And how it should make me
look
feel
perform
For a long time I thought freedom would be
Being seen
Being understood
Making the the character more Honest
But as I stood on the stage
Anxious
Ready to bare my skin
I realized I didn’t owe the audience anything
None of them
To be free
I couldn’t be Paid
Don’t get me wrong, I love the currency of
Affection
Admiration
Respect
But the whole truth can never be
Performed
Who knows if I can even see all of myself
There are always difficult angles
And tricks of the light
And shifting landscapes
And new scrapes and bruises
It couldn’t be about them
It couldn’t be a performance
There was no story to tell
No matter how “true”
I had to walk off the stage
And stand in the daylight outside the theater
And just
Be
