Who is the fairest of them all?
The beautiful stolen child
or the mysterious dead man of
your dreams?
The mirror can't tell you secrets
or offer you good advice.
It won't recognize that you've changed;
the hair, the hands, the face.
The corruption that beat the grace.
There's no difference between the child
whose smile lit up like Christmas lights
and the woman whose eyes scream tears. 5 comments
The mirror won't understand the new you;
the wiser eyes and wider face.
The years teach the mind well,
but the face suffers.
It can't bring back the memory of
the lovely fair-haired girl;
you hid together under the table,
cloth pulled down for cover,
stealing sweets meant for after dinner.
She went away,
to sit in the clouds, her mother would say.
Years later, standing by the grave,
you still found yourself looking up. 4 comments
And the pictures of headless grandparents,
their memories faded like the
yellowing snapshots that captured a
life you swore you'd never lived.
The mirror never changes unless it breaks,
but you do.
It sees one life;
though you try to separate the past
from the present.
The glass will reflect what you want to see,
the person you desire to be.
It will let you believe you are something
other than what you are. 1 comment
In yourself you see the mother
you despised and loved,
cuddled and shoved
and dreamed was somebody else.
And the ghost of a memory of a father,
who's existence you rejected
for the importance of pride.
And the friends you realized were
as useless as the toys that
lasted a week after Christmas.
And the days under the sun,
that led you to believe that life
would always cater to your
unreality. 2 comments
Existing now somewhere between
youth and tender old age,
trying to gauge the awful recesses of the mind
long after the truth left you
stumbling behind.
The promise of the return
of those letters you once burned;
the loss of the good,
the sharing of blood.
The mirror counts its cracks
but you refuse to spot the damage;
ignorance is an easier form of acceptance.
Still the glass sees you for
what you really are,
after all, it watched you grow.
It comprehends what you don't know.
And he'll be watching from somewhere,
that irrelevant father figure you once craved.
He's only here now because
he couldn't be there before,
and it doesn't matter that you
don't need him anymore.
You just keep closing your eyes
and your heart against the damage
