What she Saw

She sensed herself in the mirror,

but the image wasn’t her own.

The face was smooth

and

young,

but foreign, misplaced, wrong.

She had seen herself before,

had counted each of the lashes

which closed like a trap over her eyes.

She had watched her mouth tense countless

times without revealing too much

of herself.

But this woman was a stranger.

She splashed some water onto

her face

and let the droplets descend

along her

cheeks.

Still, the reflection did not waver.

The young girl was there,

gazing back through

those traps set to lids,

a dark red

before the mascara smeared.

She was pale.

She knew nothing of the world

that held her.

She knew nothing of herself

or anything else that had came along

through the years

like shards from the mirror,

reflecting the stains in her eyes.

But the image stood firm.

At her center was

someone who knew,

someone who had seen

their fair share

and failed to shake it off

like so many others had done

before her.

That woman there, she pointed,

could be tempted. She could be

hurt, damaged, broken beyond

repair.

I am not that woman, she said.

She had thrown off the man in her life

like an old rag

too dirty to wash.

She threw him away

in the same way

he threw her aside

and trampled that last part

of her that remained

pure.

The feeling of loss never came,

just the reflection of a young girl

that forced her to stare back at herself.

It’s a symptom, she said, nothing more.

I’m sick and it will only be a matter of time before

I’m well again.

Being ill taunted her.

She could feel the nausea like poison,

feel the heart race a little faster

with just a memory,

with the flash of an image

of the way he smiled,

or how he would hold her

so close that

the tension

melted

like wax along a rose colored

candle she only lit for him.

A small breath of laughter,

and he vanished,

but the girl in the mirror

remained,

droplets of water

drying

in the reflection

of a pool

she knelt beside,

hoping to rinse away the hurt

that was caused by the man

who took her innocence

away.

The mirror of water rippled away

with a touch from

the same finger

she used to point

at him in accusation

when she caught him

with that other girl

who looked just

like the reflection

she was staring at 

right now.