Who’s there? Why do you stare at me so, behind those shades, with that cryptic smile on your face? Why do you tilt your body just so, as if seeking the best angle to see through my carefully crafted facade?
Damn, you see right through me, don’t you? You recognize phony when you see it because you embrace who you really are — not a snowman at all but an avatar, a callback to a winter now passed and a story lost to time.
I bet you and the other plush toys have a belly laugh at our expense, you with your soft cynicism and your jovial artifice. “Come join us, imposter! We’re not what we seem, either! There’s not a gram of frozen water in my bones, and yet you wrap a scarf around my neck to fend off the cold.” He can see that I, too, am only pretending.
On the other hand, if I pretend to be a poet long enough, and practice hard, perhaps one day I’ll write something poetic. That’s how humans grow. He will always be a soft, ironic imitation of a snowman. I may be a soft, ironic imitation of an artist today, but given time and effort I may become one. Poor little toy, he can only smile as if he knows something, but the smile is all he knows.
