I. Appearances

The ballroom tilts. The mirrors double-count
our bodies, stitching fur to borrowed skin.
The wolf perfects his charm; the witch, affront.
The trickster learns which grin is discipline.
We waltz in borrowed masks, our faces lent
to appetite and rumor, slick with gin.
Each step repeats the oath we never meant,
each turn rehearses how the trap begins.
The mirrors swear there’s only what we see.
The maze insists the fault is in the eyes.
I follow, thinking freedom means to be
unfixed—unowned—until the music lies.
The wolf leads gently. That is how it starts.
The hand is light. The teeth are at the heart.

II. Arguments

The fur comes loose. It always does at last.
The witch stands bare, her spell a cracked device.
The trickster laughs too late—he’s overpast
the moment when the joke might still suffice.
The mirrors hold. They will not be outpaced.
They name what danced as fraud, what paid as price.
There was no center—only being chased:
The maze contracts, its logic undisguised.
You called it play. You called it changing roles.
You said the lead was equal, step for step.
But someone bleeds when symmetry dissolves.
The wolf remembers while the others slept.
We are all masks—yes—but some faces bite,
and some are only bitten in the night.