This morning I’m bedeviled
by a ghost, its heart disheveled,
and its face a darkened mirror
in which I do not appear.
Its presence grips and rends me
and its empty glass upends me.
Only monsters lack reflections;
am I that? Am I not here?
It sings a plea for kindness
-- ever blind to its own blindness;
while I beg for its departure,
it pretends it cannot hear.
In vain I’ve tried to cease it,
and in vain tried to release it,
crying, Please don’t make me face
that glass so empty and so clear!
From a distance I could ache for--
oh, my heart could even break for—
this poor specter so unfairly bound,
so wracked with grief and fear…
Yet this ghost returns to find me,
and with adamance remind me
it won’t let me redefine me
when it hovers ever near.
Though my eyes are red with weeping
ghostly mercy must be sleeping;
No – I see on closer study
neither eye, nor mouth, nor ear.
And how strange to now perceive it--
I can barely yet believe it--
underneath that horrid mirror
is a face I still hold dear.
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