Pretending

Skimming on the surface of life
Never staying long
One step
One step ahead
in this dance of pursuit
tantalizing
the ones who stole my past
mortgaged my future
stained my hands
with blood.

Perfect understanding is my key
perfect understanding and
perfect ignorance.

Fear me, you wicked
I hear the whispers of your victims
I know the deaths they died
I know the secrets you tried to hide
I am the sword of Justice
I am the Angel of Death
I will not pass you by.

And yet my own guilt whispers
the faces of my dead
haunt me, asking
Are you any better than
those you hate?
Are you any closer to finding
the ones you love?

Skimming on the surface of life
Blending in so perfectly
Fleetly, fleetingly
So, so knowing
So unknown
Reaching out, connecting
from high to low
casting smiles
and then I go.

Free as a fox
A lost chameleon
I can be anyone
anyone I want to be --
anyone at all but me.

I know the statutes of the law
I know the secrets of the dead
Can read the track of a cougar's paw
I know the whispers left unsaid.
I read the sky, I chase the wind,
I trek the desert and the sea
Plant a string of false degrees
and make each one of them ring true.

For all I know
for all I do
there is one thing I cannot find.
I know so many, many things
but there's no answer to this cry:
Who am I? Who am I?

-- Kathryn A