10. skinned alive, peeled too far

so i gave one final try to be a drop in the pond

but i'm much too dry to be poured upon

no ripples of change, no washing baptism

never again will i cry, too weak or too strong

now it's a grey-shaded sigh that doesn't move me along

no measures of range, an existing organism

and i push my sense with the weight of a song

that never relents with the writing of wrongs

i'll break my back til i'm sweaty in shambles

with forceful stints, crutches i lean upon

in fatiguing vents that will soon be gone

kicking dust in their tracks, but i continue to ramble

and i laugh at the mirror, but i'm not tickled pink

just a red faced jeerer writing in fickle ink

resenting the finger, pointed back mockingly

to see i am the sound, the voice, the singer

but i keep listening not all too shockingly

one last attempt to be a sheep in the flock

mixing the seen and the dreamt to construct a road block

i don't and yet i do want to be like all of them

the cross-armed contempt keeps the stubborn locked

feeling forever exempt, not trying what i knock

to fit in with all of you, integrity be damned

and i pull with the power of a piss poor verse

each draft more sour, too careful and rehearsed

the repetitive movement numbing both of my hands

and chapter away hours with an inner research

hoping to pull up a flower as i dig in the dirt

but the mounds are proven without growth in the land

and i smirk at admirations, both given and gotten

what once had your praise is now shunned and rotten

the made-up, shaped up skin, now a useless hide

because you see now where it begins

and why it should have remained inside