Mirrors
There before me is the yawning mirror.
Inside I see nakedness and excited pinkness, the frame
of someone I could never have known as a child.
My chest before me swells with false pride untold
standing atop my well-fed belly, which withdraws into its cavity
under the scrutiny of its persecutor like a fretful whelk.
I hoist my hands up to examine them. They tremble and falter
unable to hoist the stones they once did, ashen and scraped,
to the fire pit where our laughter would echo over the lake.
My legs are moorings to these cold tiles, which shock
the pads of my feet. They have felt the blades and twigs
once inconceivable in the softness of youth.
They are strong where my hands are not;
they have traversed and sojourned and have not broken.
They are not cast from terra-cotta as they once were.
We all perform this thing, this surveying of the body:
Some days, we are our hands, tired and broken.
Others, our feet, bounding over body-built soils.
We're holding one another in this night.
Though the cold betrays our clothing,
placing us naked-- mirror to mirror--
I do not sway in this moment
and my hand remains still upon your head.
Inside I see nakedness and excited pinkness, the frame
of someone I could never have known as a child.
My chest before me swells with false pride untold
standing atop my well-fed belly, which withdraws into its cavity
under the scrutiny of its persecutor like a fretful whelk.
I hoist my hands up to examine them. They tremble and falter
unable to hoist the stones they once did, ashen and scraped,
to the fire pit where our laughter would echo over the lake.
My legs are moorings to these cold tiles, which shock
the pads of my feet. They have felt the blades and twigs
once inconceivable in the softness of youth.
They are strong where my hands are not;
they have traversed and sojourned and have not broken.
They are not cast from terra-cotta as they once were.
We all perform this thing, this surveying of the body:
Some days, we are our hands, tired and broken.
Others, our feet, bounding over body-built soils.
We're holding one another in this night.
Though the cold betrays our clothing,
placing us naked-- mirror to mirror--
I do not sway in this moment
and my hand remains still upon your head.