MASK
We live in an era where the word mask has become ubiquitous. However this poem was written in another time, not very long ago. It was written in December of twenty fourteen, just about six years back. Then it got lost among lots of others amidst many that I wrote and did not complete or was discarded. Few days back as I was rummaging through some of my old folders, I found this and found it to be surprisingly complete. I think this still have relevance today, albeit not in a sense that we associate masks with now a days.
The moment we entered the world
We are marked.
Labels defined us at every step.
We are sons, daughters, brothers, sisters.
Every step we made, every progression,
Got labeled and defined for us.
We are smart, fool, lazy, successful.
Labeled nicely in boxes as per societies’ norms.
World as we know,
Won’t let us live as ourselves
Break those norms,
We are labeled as rebels, misfits,
To be put down with all their might.
Conform or perish,
Lead or follow,
Succeed or fail,
Be religious (whatever it means),
Or rot in hell (as if enough hell is not created in this world).
Every step we take,
Yardsticks are out to measure
Our fit to a new label.
We are not allowed to be ourselves.
Deified or demonized or in between.
We are all wearing a mask,
Masking us from ourselves
In this journey through life.
Blissfully unaware that
Anonymous we came and
and will leave to anonymity.
At journey’s end,
These masks of label,
Won’t be of any use to us.
Fleeting Muse 
Funny how “complete” those set-aside poems can sometimes be! I recently found four such gems, polished them a little, and sent them off to a contest. Here is an early 1900’s poem about masks. It’s about hiding out real selves from others, but fit the current situation surprisingly well.
WE WEAR THE MASK
We wear the mask that grins and lies,
It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes,
This debt we pay to human guile;
With torn and bleeding hearts we smile,
And mouth with myriad subtleties.
Why should the world be over-wise,
In counting all our tears and sighs?
Nay, let them only see us, while
We wear the mask.
We smile, but, O great Christ, our cries
To thee from tortured souls arise.
We sing, but oh the clay is vile
Beneath our feet, and long the mile;
But let the world dream otherwise,
We wear the mask!
Paul Laurence Dunbar
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Jane, thank you so much for sharing the poem Mask. I wrote mine may be a year before I started my blog. Not sure if I even had WhatsApp then. So the poem languished in some old folder. I still believe in what I wrote then and think it still applies. So I decided to share.
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Thank you for sharing this poem on Mask. This is always and universally relevant.
Do you stay masked, my friend? Or shake those off whenever you can?
Here’s my poem on Mask, which you have already read on FB.
Masked Time
Knew of masks
Performers wear
During their shows
of dance or plays.
Or of doctors and nurses
During surgery.
Now it is a Masked world
Wherever one goes,
Wherever one looks.
Men, women, children all
Covered up
like the backward Muslim women of the species.
Just that now it’s not backward anymore.
It’s a matter of life and death,
When God Almighty plays His
Divine Roulette!
This one goes!
This one stays!
Oh what a torture!
The newborns now
Will have tiny masks on.
Oh what a pity
They are deprived of looking at the adoring smiling faces hovering around them wherever they
May be!
And what a loss too
For the not so youngs
Being deprived of
the divine babies’ smiles!
O how I wish for
A Maskless time!
A Maskless world!
Full of joyful smiles!
Syeda Jebeen Sabira Shah.
New York. 25 August, 2020
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This physical mask is a necessity of the time we live in for the greater good of humanity and hopefully we shall shed them one day soon. The mental mask that we carry with us and hide behind is the one difficult to get rid of.
Thanks for reading and sharing your poem.
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