Standing at the Edge of Water

what do I deserve
standing beneath the sun the same as everyone else.
but not the same, or not in the same way.
Sometimes the misanthropes, we
are the very sweetest of all.
We shudder, and shout inside,
we remove ourselves from the great
and expensive
theatre of conflict.
From the prizefights sewn into our bellies,
from the fact that we are afraid of all of you.
We are afraid you will see us there, mask removed,
crying into our wine at beauty which we want to share
into the day, but cannot. 
We know most of you will snub us out, every chance you get.
Most of you take the truth of us and wrap it up in the back
of your hand --- laugh, tease, disengage, belittle.
We hate you, because we do not.
We loathe everything all of you do, simply
because we would absorb the pain along with our own.
Our love to give becomes a sort of blood letting---
and we're let go into the abyss,
but once we are alone there, in the dark,
we see it goes only to our knees.  The black water-
smiling up at us, our friend.
We then turn back to you folk and your perfectly happy crowd,
laughing like idiots, remarking not of the fact that we All-
were born under this sun,
and we all deserve--- Everything.

~ M. Lucia