guy fawkes mask

i've watched v for vendetta with everyone
i've ever dated. i don't know what that says about me.
i guess i am trying to ask them,
how do you feel about masks? about what
we keep beneath them? sometimes i'll see
an edge lord with a guy fawkes mask
bumper sticker & i kind of want to tear it off.
i want to knock on their window & ask,
"have you ever even seen a fire?" 
we have been too loose with symbols i think
or else maybe i am just finding a small detail
to be furious at instead of the big 
soul-eating things that are hard to even
explain anymore. sometimes when people ask me
how i'm doing i'll just let the silence do the work.
other days when my brain is a vending machine 
i'll lie & say, "i'm doing good." 
i think i love v for vendetta
because i crave the myth that one body 
could save us. that in the darkness there is a spirit
of all our rage. is this the remnants of my catholocism? 
a salvation would be nice though. the first time i saw
v for vendetta we watched it on a portable 
dvd player sitting on folding chairs. 
the room fell away. the screen, enveloping us. 
i watched as v made the birds in a nest.
the next morning, my boyfriend cooked that
for me. the egg surrounded by toast.
sweet butter. glowing yolk.
days later i almost bought a guy fawkes mask.
i did not have any plans with it.
i just wanted to feel not alone. a current to hold
my hungers. the world asks
so much of us. fingers & dimes. 
i don't want to buy a mask anymore.
where would i go with it anyway? i am not that man.
i have seen the fires already & they have seen me.
we do not all want the same midnight. oh if only we did. 
mine has sugar & a heavy moon. theirs
has a pane of glass from which they dream 
of watching us burn.