In Which She Puts to Rest the Mirror

It was 1913, at Wrentham, the actress visited, saw me captured in
the mirror.
She raged awhile, tossed volumes of words, could not steal rapture from
the mirror.

Polished glass reflects light without diffusing, gives back the clear image
of anything before it. They learn—no denying stature in the mirror.

I was taught to foxtrot, smile with grace, portray the blind freed from
fear.
Fear, that fleeting partner who found me, locked, immobile in the mirror.

How can she know her beauty? tell her flaws? learn how age lights on her
without the persuading echo of the mirror?

I opened my palm to listen, Teacher spelled, “The lake reflects the trees
real as when God made them, perfect as a mirror.”

Love on my face, what was that? Loss in my heart, what was that?
Reflect these merely in a surface? Why would I want the mirror?

The children’s fingers, like wildflowers, told the world true
as a piece of glass reflects knowledge, in silence, in a mirror.

When you cross to the next room after death, Helen, the light is yours,
the birdsong clear, the wind through trees tells God. You’ll know, without
the mirror.