The Creature in the Box

Step right up, ladies and gentlemen

Peek inside if you dare.

I've got a rare creature inside this box; pretty and ugly,

you know how the world works.

It's never left its box, but it's traveled the world,

from the Puerto Rican guettos to the beautiful New England mountains.

It eats dreams like mints, and then charges at them like an angry bull,

and either crashes into them in victory,

or swoops right past them,

like a space ship just missing the moon by this much…

The creature lives alone, and with everyone.

It hasn’t left its box, as you know, so it talks over its edges,

because the only people the creature has let in

have destroyed the inside of its space, time and time again.

The creature’s not dumb; it knows when to stop.

It loves from a distance and lives in its box.

It learned this, funny story, from people who it thought could

turn its walls into glass, and from glass turn them into nets…

But as soon as the walls would morph into clear, thin glass,

they were stricken down, and the shards shot at the creature,

transforming its skin into a bloody, patterned surface...

See those scars? That’s no coincidence.

Those are the scars that come from trying again and again.

But the creature, somehow, tries again and again.

Not with the same people, of course; as I said, the creature is not dumb.

It looks for the good in others, with the hopes that at least someone in this world

will not crawl into its box

and hurt it with its own sharp edges,

and then, maybe, just maybe, it can build a net,

and from that net move out into a box that doesn’t need to be transformed or changed,

but one made out of love.

Not romantic love; just love;

love that makes you feel like you are finally where you are able to feel,

where you are able to be that ugly, beautiful creature you keep in your own box,

the one you shake and tumble whenever you take a bad step.

The creature inside this box is ambitious,

and it knows that it has to leave its box,

and while a box made of love and abstracts would sound wonderful,

it cannot wait. It never has.

My creature is trying to leave its box behind,

like a hermit crab, like a nomadic being in search of something different…

My creature is flawed, and it will hurt,

and its scars will be worn forever.

Do you dare look at the creature in your own box?

I’m tired of seeing people feel sorry for me whenever I explain that

the thing I keep surrounded by these four cardboard walls

is me, and it has always been me, and it will always be me.

I don’t need sorry – I plead your action.

They’ll walk up, apologize on life’s behalf, and then walk up, just as closed up as any other box…

What you need, what you want, is to reveal that animal inside you,

say, “I’m broken, but I’m ready,” and only then,

at that moment,

will revealing my creature have been worth it to you.

I know it’s hard; the truth is the hardest pill to swallow…

But taking the first step is the only thing that’ll bring you closer to anything.

You can’t stop there, in the face of a problem, and leave it as it is.

So this is me.

I am the creature in the box.

I am breaking free, slowly, and I’m looking for a better home.

I’m looking for you to do the same.