I Can't Feel The Real

*** I'd better post a warning before this poem. It's not me. It's not me or I wouldn't be looking for a place to rent in Calgary so I can stay here and visit with family and friends some more. But this is what I see and what I fear as the result of the phoniness I've been on a posting crusade against. It's called I Can't Feel The Real. I reckon Johnny Cash could write a good song for these lyrics eh?

I can't feel the real. I need somehow to heal.

Family and all my friends

lose the hurt after it offends

but I have to conceal

that I can't feel the real.

 

They say that time can heal. That blood and love are real.

I used to share the joy and care

for brothers and sisters everywhere

but now put on the zeal

cuz I can't feel the real.

 

I have a hole in me that I can't let you see.

That which once was beautiful

is now becoming dutiful 

and even worse professional.

I wear a mask of steel

cuz I can't feel the real.

 

Lord disinfect my head or at least strike me dead

when I bypass the sanctity

of children playing happily,

of innocence and honesty.

I cling to the surreal

when I can't feel the real.

I have one thing to give, one reason left to live.

I will not share its counterfeit

of which there is a vast surfeit

I’d rather cease, surrender, quit

than lie and cheat and steal

cuz I can’t feel the real.