Poetic Paragraphs

Makeup

You can't go out like that.

Not with your skin bare of lies, truth still clinging to your body.

The world outside is full of people who can't see you like this. You need to prepare, get ready to face them all with a face that isn't your own.

So you do.

You stand in front of the bathroom mirror and put on your armour.

First, the primer to set it all up. A layer to make the rest easier, the undergarments of your costume. The beginning step of the charade you'll play for the rest of the day.

Because every time you step out the door, you need to be in your prime, live in the moment, smile like the world can keep spinning and you don't even care. You are young and ready for life to take you on.

That's what it means to be in your prime of your life.

And that is what you will tell the world, smiling confidently, letting that layer of protection shield your face from the doubts.

Because inside, you're scared. You're frightened that the world is turning and your spool of life is turning with it. The length of your existence is getting shorter every moment. And one day, you'll walk another step against the pull of the spinning world and find yourself dropping the last piece of that thread, watching it fade from view as you fall into a grave.

But not now.

Not like this.

Nobody will have to see the fears that decorate your face. You're primed for success, ready to put on the next layer of your painted-on personality, and this first layer will make it stick to your face.

You don't want the world to see you when the makeup smudges off.

So you grab the foundation, letting that set into your skin. It is the base, the stage on which you'll stand while you smile.

Because you can't show them that the world might give out underneath your feet, leaving you to freefall through life, grabbing onto branches that give way at the tug of your desperate hands. You can't let them know that you aren't who you're chalked up to be. You can't let them see that your life isn't a fairytale, your purpose isn't rock solid, and the tiny flaws and cracks in your personality might trip you up and bring you down.

There's cracks in your foundation, so you put on store-bought paste to cover them all up.

You have your spray-on youth in a can, and it fixes things.

And on this fake foundation, sturdy stage, you can build a delicate tower of character traits that don't quite belong to you.

They don't have to know.

Your foundation is rock solid now, and they won't be able to see past it unless you let them in.

And what they can still see, you can conceal.

It's not that hard.

They don't have to know the faltering smile, twitching eyes, grey-dark bruises from sleepless nights and turmoiled thoughts.

You paint the concealer on over the flaws you don't want people to see, covering them up so you can live like you would without them. As long as it's on, you can pretend to be another person.

One with enough sleep to throw out the bags under your eyes.

One with enough time to smile and laugh like you're swimming in a million moments filled with potential instead of scrambling for the last drips of possible success.

You conceal the things you don't want people to know, and build another layer of character over it.

(They don't need to know who you are. They just know who you want to be.)

And this way, you will never lose face; you can always paint it right back on.

Your costume isn't complete without the eyes.

Windows to the soul, they called them, but you don't need people to peer into your soul.

They can't look in if you pull the drapes.

So you trace a line of black over your eye, adding eyelashes thick and long, and this way, it's almost as if people won't notice your irises.

Struck by the dynamic darkness around the windows to your soul, they won't look inside.

Because your soul is the cluttered closet of your mind, the place where you stuff your doubts when they don't fit under your bed, and it's filled to the brim with insecurities.

After you snap shut the drapes to the windows of your soul, you trace your lips red. It will add color to your thoughtless words, weight to your airy ideas.

Because when things are spoken by a pretty mouth, it's easier for others to hear them.

Put on the powder to protect your look, and you're done.

You put down the makeup, stand back, look in the mirror and see how you've saved face, saved your face.

And with that, you've saved your character, your personality.

Because you are wearing your armour, locked behind a fortress of pastes and creams, and the only way for someone to scrape the lies, the cover-ups, from your face is by losing theirs.

There is no honor in wiping the makeup from another's face.

You all have something to hide.

You can't step out without it.

And for all of them, you are the person you pretend to be.

Your makeup will make up for the person you're not, and it's better this way. 

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(Sorry if I messed it up, I used a lot of google for this. If there's guys reading this, kudos for making it through! Special thanks to @_Solar_Rayz_ for the makeup help.)

(Any suggestions for next week's topic?)