A Present Mirror
- October 2018
- September 2019
[part I]
Mirrors only reflect the present
they’re useless for progress or nostalgia
More to the point
There is much more
Sharp, angles and degrees making teeth
That’s how it was then
Standing in the doorframe with no return
Replaying the fatal frustration that collapsed options
into a column of cascading sheets
into a physical thing you could sense over your shoulder
A stand of deer at dusk
camouflaged against the treeline behind
Mold and gray leaves, a stalking humidity
unhurriedly lingering
against the walls with no real reason to be there but
no motivation to materialize
anywhere else
Ghosts of bound paper and beach stones
stolen from coasts
line the bookshelves like overcrowded neighborhood tenements
Horizontal barriers each vertical address
1939 Starlight Rider Way
1946 River Man Drive
Each avenue bordered by a 90 degree lake of dust
mile markers measured out in inches
Old towns, older still, the quiet resolve in each room
despite the promise of adventure and violence
But most of the doors have been closed for decades
Doors with no glass
and no reflections
[part II]
You pick up an ax
long rusted against a web
of propped-up storm windows
which are also rusting
A collection of metal frames and anchors
exposed to the weather
The siding of the brown barn wall is black behind them
an atmosphere created by chance and neglect
a passive and temporary microcosm
There is wood to be halved
but you're not working today
The ax hangs as an extension of your arm
lingers idly in the two and fro of
the inevitable and natural swinging motion
every ax is accustomed to when lifted
from its resting place
This heavy pendulum
marks the kind of time
only dogs and midwives can count
Their instincts linked to a divine radiance
that most of us mistake for witchcraft
But no, it's a careful and measurable fractal
adjacent to but not from
the breath of lunar orbits
and golden ratios
The quiet spiders huddle beneath the boat dock
they can hear you now
Your uneven gait is transcribed
as the dry leaves beneath your feet
collapse with different tunings
The difference in each left and right is compared
and carried along the ground fog with your approach
If you had let go of the ax
the spiders would have lost
their triangulation of your position
and remained dormant
Unaware beneath the wooden planks
at the edge of the lake
Instead, they take note
with each step
and move with advance purpose
positioning themselves clear
of your predicted interference
You finally step up
and onto the dock, and
when you do
you are the only living thing upon it
