How to be a Liar

This poem is to some extent a response to Poet's United Thursday Think Tank prompt from last week: How To.


How to be a Liar

It begins with a pact; a promise

“Don’t tell daddy,” she says

But in all of your childishness

or perhaps rather a premature intelligence

you’re compelled to know why

before entering even a verbal contract such as this

He won’t understand

It’s plain and simple

He’ll misinterpret

and someone will be deeply hurt

And from that point on

there's this suppressed, unacknowledged terror

that lies beneath your diaphragm, as you agree to keep it

a secret

Not for daddy’s sake, no

but but surely for mommy’s.

Because you and mommy

might as well have slashed cuts

at your palms

and touched bloodlines

because, just in case you hadn’t shared the blood bond before,

You now are forever entangled.

And it doesn’t end with daddy, no

(though he is long gone by now)

Pact upon pact

Bond upon bond

they pile up until the stories flow steadily like rivers

and the people

are towns, no, worlds

just settled along the bank

which is merely a pile of your own untruths.

But when she and you are in this together

You are a duo of misunderstood bandits

stealing from one life to the next

Survival of the fittest, it’s called

And the secrecy is your role,

Your duty to the sacred bond

You’re old enough!

The machine can’t function without you

You’re clearly aware of that

And, like that, it’s almost a matter of life or death

And while you did not ask to start over, again,

She reminds you that you probably need it just as she does

And it touches you nonetheless

And it’s all right,

justified even,

and when that’s the case

it almost masks completely

that you’re nothing but a liar.

Just a little author's note: This poem is freshly written, and now that I have it all on paper, I feel pretty confident in saying that this is one of those poems that I never want to read again.