a poem that flowed from my heart

I wrote this poem while in a bout of frustration. I was frustrated with how easily I saw people cover their true emotions and instead exude a false comment or facial expression, like when someone is smiling and you know they are not smiling on the inside. Or is it just me? I've been feeling lately that I am much more in tune with sensing authenticity, perhaps because I feel a sweeping change of myself, as if I've been digging and have found a new layer of my being. 

For the first time, I got up in front of a crowd at my college and read a poem, this poem, hoping that its words would reach out to someone and help peel back a few layers towards their true self. Tall order? I think not. I believe I have an influence on the world. 

When I read this poem, I expressed it as a spoken word pro might do, speeding up and slowing down, loud then soft, pausing. 
When you read it, try to read it with your heart. 

I was born into this mess
And through life I digress
Torn by judgement and ego
Our realization is too slow
I see you snide and act out
while morality becomes thin and stout
How can our world be a better place
when a candied mask is on your face?
The dirt piles and piles under the rug
the smile you smile is only smug
to "have it all" we must first be bare
strip our layers, all our cares
The answer must come from inside
no help from books, people, websites,
no guide through school, religion, exercise,
Nothing but the heart for the insight
But we layer our authenticity
with tattered fabric we cannot see
Ending in a blindness, a slow disease
The disease is our glutinous way
with a quick fix keeping sadness at bay
Enlightenment avoids a cluttered mind
it is a patient, vacant, subtle kind
We cannot preach with fangs for teeth
or pretend stone hearts have a beat
Lying and silence are sometimes the same
Not ill words, ill thoughts are to blame
so
How can we feel the sun's warmth,
with a veil over our face?
How can we experience love,
without humility or grace?
We must shed our skins, accept every scar
To find consciousness, who we really are.