The self-diagnosed narcissist who believes that a conclusion is the same as a cure.

The starving artist who is in fact well-fed but gets by on the caricature.

He who claims that existence is a burden and goes no further.

He who proclaims he is a bad man from a soapbox and believes that makes him a good man.

He who admits when he is wrong as some sort of harmless, gaudy penance.

He who lies then says “I am a liar” then lies some more.

He who cheats then says “I am a cheater” then cheats some more.

He who steals then says “I am a thief” then claims existence is a burden then goes no further.

He who cries when he is caught for no other reason than that’s what one is supposed to do when they are caught.

He who stands on mountaintops, feeling the wind in his hair, the redemption in his soul, but cannot let it in because he spends too much time an omniscient third-party, watching he who lies and cheats and keeps his soapbox at the ready.

He who steals two cookies from the jar and feels guilt.

He who presents a cookie to his mother as an admission of wrongdoing.

He who is not punished because he admitted he was bad.

He who splits his remaining stolen dessert with the girl in class.

She who sees a lying boy with half a cookie, a narcissist in denial on a mountaintop, and a bad man on a soapbox,

And tells him that existence is nothing more than wet pavement.

He who is angry at the assumption that his bag of tricks is transparent.

He who walks home from class in the rain, half a soggy cookie turning to apple-sauce in his pocket.

He who sees the asphalt and the potholes and stress marks of the burden of tons upon tons of steel and rubber over years upon years,

He who sees the garbled reflection of steel sky and roving yellow and white and red lumens from fords and chevys,

He who wipes the wetness from his face  —  only rain, he swears it; this is not what one is supposed to do,

Not when he is supposed to cry.

He who does it anyway.