Croaking Under the Sun

I run around with this paper cup in hand,

handing out smiles in return for cynicism and more laughter. 

I am probably stupid

to bear the misery they have to offer 

Source: Google images 

weighing my pockets down

just so I can be myself,

but it seemed so much easier 

than lunging around much heavier masks 

of happiness and sorrow;

prim and proper. 

Of love and hate colliding 

against the face that perceives. 

So, I chucked them all 

as people taught me to build 

the same

with restraint and probable intelligence,

to immerse myself in blissful nonchalance. 

I won't drown. 

Agony vanishes in water

and nothing else keeps me down

as I fight heavy judgmental

currents 

telling my tale to the fish that leaps 

forth into the air so bereft while full of life 

for brief laps of time,

enjoying the edge but always back to safety,

unlike me.

I don't know how to swim yet.

But croak I shall if I must 

as I am,

but never cloak.*

*It doesn't apply when I am flying around saving people. Just saying.