Drop the Persona

          Drop the Persona 

When I breezed by a headline 

the other day about Johnny Depp 

suing his ex-wife for defamation 

of character, and testifying 

about his behavior during their marriage, 

my first thought was whether he 

would be able to drop his Hollywood persona 

and stand boldly before the court, 

in his own true self, sans the ‘act.’ 

Of course, my second and third thoughts 

questioned whether either you or I 

would be able to surrender our own persona, 

if we were called upon, in the moment.

 to drop the ‘act’ and be fearlessly authentic? 

"Like a bird on the wire   

  Like a drunk in a midnight choir   

  I have tried in my way to be free” 

  (Bird on a Wire, 1969, by Leonard  Cohen)

Well, Leonard, “I have tried in my way to be free,” 

as the landscape of my past is littered with cast aside 

masks, that I have willingly dropped along the way. 

For all that, I cannot state equivocally that I have 

dropped all my personas, and how about you?

©Paul Goldman April 23, 2022

[no photo attribution found]