Ego Masks Poem by Domenic Marbaniang

Everyone’s great, or so one feels.
If no such feeling, can anyone live?
The desire to rule is not very bad, not at all.
Only misdirected.
To have dominion was man created.
But he can’t even rule his own spirit.
A slave to passion, a slave to the world,
Unruled passion, kings of destiny – but still slaves,
If one can will, but one can’t.

I’m better than most, better than all.
If none such feeling, won’t I continually fall?
Vainful ego, vain contentions,
Ego-contentions, Ego-war,
Ego-affronts, Ego-masks,
Ego-presumptions, Ego-affections,
‘I’ must prevail, ‘truth’ not.
Downroad destruction.

Imagination, warped reality, self’s own construction.
Ego (I) spins a world of its own:
Everyone has a world of his own.
Where world’s agree, favors arise.
Where world’s collide, wars arise.
Worlds are egos, Egos wear masks.
So are all agreements, masked.
Behind the veil hides the unknown, which ego finds not.

And falling forwards,
Faces the world behind its mask, created by the world.
And the world wears masks.
But it has its own world, its own understanding.
Yet behind the dynamic – flux of these worlds
Lies the unknown, static, stately, still, who knows?

It sees its face in the mirror of its world
And sees the mask.
It takes it for its face
And so takes its world for its face.
Therefore, worlds are egos, I say.
You never see the truth; for truth is itself masked.

But remove the mask
What remains is the unknown.
The mask is better than the unknown.
And where one is unsure of the truth,
There teachers prevail.
And the teachers wear masks, give masks.

‘This thing cannot be known, except it were given to you by the Father.’
‘Lord, search me and try me.
Send forth thy light and thy truth.’