I lie a lot.
It\'s a personal thing
I lug around behind me
Like a commuter at the airport
I don\'t lie about people.
I lie about facts.
The color of my eyes,
The scale pointing north of 300.
I bite the truth and chew it up,
Letting my gnashors tramp and stamp
The words into new, exotic locations
And spit them out wholesale
I once lied that my dad had met Buzz Aldrin
On a secret CIA mission to protect
Tony the Tiger from terrorists
Planting Nokias strapped to explosives.
I remember fibbing my way
Into the ravishing girl from Lunch hour\'s
Hidden secrets,
With halitosis whispers of worship
And wisteria moans.
I could\'ve told her the truth,
That she was cute,
And I was a virgin,
And that together we could kill the kids inside.
I lie because it\'s more fun
To take the verisimilitude of the world
And wrap it into a doughy ball
And pound it with mochi hammers
Sit back and taste the ChatGPT generated responses
That succor to the flames in our ribs
That flutters when we get the next medal of honorable discharge.
I lied about my medication making me see shadows on the walls
I lied about my fingers shaking along Coke cans.
I lied about missing him in a heartbeat that stopped a long time ago
I lied about my past just as surely
As someone else might comment on
A pair of baby shoes in a window.
I take the truth and wrap a ribbon made of vocal chords, tie it up nice and neat,
And give you something prettier instead.