THE MAN WHO COLLECTED STRANGE FACES

THE MAN WHO COLLECTED STRANGE FACES

He kept them in a velvet room,
Behind a door of polished bone,
A thousand faces watched him sleep,
Though none of them were truly known.

He had a face for every mood,
A face for sorrow, one for rain,
A face that smiled at funerals,
And one that only spoke of pain.

He bought a face from outer space,
It had no eyes, but saw too much,
He wore it once beneath the moon,
And felt the darkness touch his touch.

A woman sold him one at dawn,
She said, “This face belonged to me.”
He placed it carefully upon his own,
And heard her laughing secretly.

The faces whispered through the night,
They told him stories from the past,
Of things that should have stayed asleep,
And doors that never should have passed.

One face began to cry at three,
Another screamed at half-past four,
The strangest one began to grin,
And pointed softly at the door.

He opened it and found himself,
Standing outside his own house there,
A man with every face he owned,
Was watching him from in the stair.

He asked, “Which one of us is real?”
The stranger smiled and shook his head,
“Your face is just a borrowed thing.”
Then every face inside went dead.

Now people say the collector walks,
With no face anyone can see,
But if you meet him in the rain,
He may be wearing one of me.