Nothing Inside 
 

    What are they thinking, what do they see?
What are they feeling when they look upon me?
Constantly watching to measure to gauge,
The person I am; it all comes from their gaze.

There's nothing inside I can look to to tell,
If I am a person substantial and well.
My life is reflections; the world is my mirror.
Without this inside, I live in great fear.

I've felt all my life as often I've said,
I'm just not a person, cause inside I'm dead.
People don't understand when you try to explain.
They have no idea of the terror, the pain.

They can't understand why you think and you feel,
That you're not a person cause you seem just as real.
They have no conception of what it is like.
For them it seems normal, as normal as sight.

With nothing inside on which you can build,
All life is a battle with no armor, no shield.
No mistakes, all perfection, cause everything counts.
The person you are all comes from without.

A person created in each reflection, each glance.
A person created, but it just does not last.
Created anew in each mirror that I see.
There's nothing inside to say what is me.

You can't know a success that's been in your past,
Cause that person is gone, it just didn't last.
There's nothing inside, on which I can build,
No person created that comes with a shield.

It only lasts until the next reflection I see,
The reflection that creates whatever is me.
From moment to moment without any past,
The person I am, it never does last.

For most a test measures things that you know.
I wish that for me a test was just so.
With nothing inside from which I can tell,
Small things become measures of personhood as well.

I live in great fear and terror and pain,
For the mirror that is me, does constantly change.
What are they thinking, what do they see?
What are they feeling when they look upon me?

When all that there is comes from without,
You walk through your life with great fear & great doubt.

Written by Chris N.