Phoenix Nicole's "Marionette" is spoken by someone who feels like a puppet, controlled by another person who pulls the strings for their own amusement. The opening line, which says the speaker and Pinocchio should be best friends, sets up the comparison: both are made to move at someone else's command. The speaker's heart is described as "accidental wood," as if their feelings were never meant to matter, and the controller treats those feelings as tiny and unimportant.
The mood is bleak and suffocating. The speaker tries to fight back, but each attempt fails, and by the middle of the poem hope, individuality and dreams have drained away. The ending is the most chilling part. The speaker flops about with a "painted-on smile," a fake cheerfulness hiding the emptiness underneath, and gives in completely. Twisting the familiar prayer into "Your will be done / For my will is gone," the final lines turn the sign-off "Yours truly" into a sad statement of ownership. The poem doesn't say who the controller is, so it could point to many kinds of controlling relationships.