Manipulation

I worry for myself

Every move on my part is accompanied with a wild sense of fear that this is not who I really am

That this is who I have been provoked to be

A lawyer, because it would make my father proud

Timid, because that's what the beatings were for

Cruel because I learned at my mother's tongue

The sly underpinnings of my childhood linger in my blood and I can only discern so much of what the effect is

I fear that one day I will look into the mirror and see an amalgamation of my parents choices, my sibling's character, my career's influence, my own family's imprint

That amongst all the others I will have no true idea of who I am

It feels as though the very air sways my mind and my decisionsFor if, controlled all its life, how will the puppet know what life is like otherwise?