Ultimate Selfishness

Was this the dream you wanted
You claim to be different, to be special
but what are your words worth,
your empty promises, whispers of gold
when every aspect of your life was carved from the ordinary

What does it mean to question everyone around you
for having become spectators of their lives
when you too watch yourself from a distance
If your name hadn't been written on it
you would have ridiculed your own life
What does that say about you

You took those vows for your own sake
and said you would never be living in the shadows
you said you'd never hide away your true core
and you'd never conform to fit in the big picture
It was for your integrity and for your soul
not for your protection, really
Protection was exactly what went wrong in the first place
it became a bubble of denial of who you were
You said you couldn't live that way
You said you'd die fighting, taking your last stand
rather than rot away in indifference

Take a look in the mirror now
Ask yourself how a stranger would view you
Would they really see all the complexity under the surface
Would you?

To everyone else, and even to yourself
you aren't different or special or complicated
They only see those basic things, those highlights
describing your life in five short words
Without having read all the poems you wrote
And they dismiss you just as easily as you dismissed them
on first sight, based on those short words,
based on their listings in this world
Isn't that the ultimate selfishness

Couldn't you please stop trying to be above the rest
Trying to fight the conventions residing in your very bones
Couldn't you ever settling for being, for existing
Doesn't sometimes ordinary do the necessary trick
but I know the answer before you even reply
you're a visionary and a poet, just as I
and to us the regular just doesn't comply
Don't I know, because I have been where you are
I am there now, without knowing if it'll ever change
I've managed to find some comfort in the smaller things
A breath, a whisper, the sun on my skin
but every now and then the realization breaks me down
I am no special, no different, from anyone else
Maybe it would be easier to bare if I didn't care
but I set out for extraordinary
I set out for the world

There's still some part of me that believes
if you aim for the stars, you could land in a tree
And from there it's closer for shot two and three
should you want to, you're free to try it with me
Maybe I'll even tell you you're special