It's a Trap

Mickey is in handcuffs.
The smile is unchanged.
It was designed to be unchanged,
the face of a corporation
that understood early
that the most powerful thing
you can sell
is the feeling of being a child
in a world that is safe
and magical
and has no corridor.

The corridor
does not care
what you came as.
The nun.
The blindfolded woman with bunny ears.
The one running
who hasn't understood yet
that the corridor
goes in both directions
and running
is just a faster way
of staying.

The tiger on the rug
who has no illusions
and has decided
the rug is enough.
They all end up here.
Same lights.
Same chairs.
Same smile
that cannot change
because changing
would mean
it was real.

It's a trap.
Not the corridor.
The smile.
The manufactured happiness
that was there before you arrived
and will be there after,
the face
that greets you
at the entrance
of every place
that wants something from you
while appearing
to give you something.

The empty chairs.
The waiting room
for the thing
that was promised
by the smile
that cannot change.

The tiger knows.
Says nothing.
Mickey smiles.
The lights hum.

And at the left edge of the frame
the woman with the gas mask
is still breathing
on her own terms,
which is,
in this corridor,
the only honest act
of resistance
left.