I am silver and exact. I have no preconceptions.
Whatever I see, I swallow immediately.
Just as it is, unmisted by love or dislike
I am not cruel, only truthful –
The eye of a little god, four-cornered.
Most of the time I meditate on the opposite wall.
It is pink, with speckles. I have looked at it so long
I think it is a part of my heart. But it flickers.
Faces and darkness separate us over and over.
Now I am a lake. A woman bends over me.
Searching my reaches for what she really is.
Then she turns to those liars, the candles or the moon.
I see her back, and reflect it faithfully
She rewards me with tears and an agitation of hands.
I am important to her. She comes and goes.
Each morning it is her face that replaces the darkness.
In me she has drowned a young girl, and in me an old woman
Rises toward her day after day, like a terrible fish.
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What I meant by the "Riddle" tag:
ReplyDeleteGive this poem to students without the title. Let them hear it aloud, and guess who/what is speaking. They will learn close-reading by having to pay attention to the clues.
Possible follow-up exercise: creative writing, to write in the voice of and the perspective of a particular object.
Thanks Danielle! It's a great piece for recreative poetry. Reminded me of Paul Tan's Reflection; I thought it might be an interesting counterpoint given that it is written from a different point of view.
ReplyDeleteWhat is it about mirrors and mortality?
Is that why morning absolutions are best
conducted in the near dark? Each day,
you stare at yourself in this flipside world,
a necessary ritual in this rumour of normality.
Do you look for the obedient schoolboy
who deferred to elders and authority,
or reassure yourself that you are the same
person who went to bed the night before?
Do you measure the wiry whiskers,
detect new lines and count the hairs
that have broken away like weary leaves,
contemplating the great escape?
Or do you drown the awkward teen
who pursued perilous poetry,
the fit national serviceman with
the strained bravado and
search for some future self, half-fearing
the imminent portent, this age-old oracle?