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Infinity's Mirror by Nat Lipstadt

Two mirrors, set in opposition observe created notional blending,
a reflecting pool of bonding's of unglued, contrary compositions.
Mirror to mirror, his imagery, fuses to Sylvia's images, hers,
faintly recollected, now living face, face to face, with his past insurrections, alters his future visions.

From cold water lake she's drawn, impaled by refracting regrets,
retrieved, drawing her words upon him, an awakening slap to drink,
beloved, tragic magic, infinitely captive.  But this old man's tiddlywinks, land-locked words, blunted instruments, needy for release & salvation, are neither silvered or exacting, just stains on a dulled, tarnished brass spittoon, except for the brunt'd bunting of lines across his roughened terrain'd face, black and white, pen and ink etched illustration of howling agitation.

His words worn down, hardened, red faced, purloined speckled pellets, damp to roll on down her rutted, almost ancient, tear streak paths, disbelieved superstitions, sacrificed for one of her living morsels of words.

Man, here to her, pledges allegiance, audaciously defiling her poetic sanctity, a visage endless repeated, delivers her shiny poem-poised countenance, even though no forgiveness from time can a mirror afford for either, from her words,  confession born, terrible truths beyond, beyond the finite.

                                                
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Mirror by Sylvia Plath

I am silver and exact. I have no preconceptions.
What ever you 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.

I missed him not in raindrops,
But in roaring tidal waves.
We were wild.

I missed him not in breezes,
But in dizzy hurricanes.
We were crazy.

I missed him not in a bouquet,
But in a maze of flower gardens.
We were lost.

I missed him not in a cloud,
But in the heavens above.
We were ethereal.

I missed him not in a rain puddle,
But in the lakes and seas.
We were deep.

I missed him not in the new world,
But in historical lands.
And up to this day, it's still the same,
We are classic.

We're still staring each other in the eyes, it's nearing 6 am.
We're still in that dingy hospital room, us and 5 of our friends.
You're still a mess, and broken down.
I still wish it was from being loved.
I wish like you wish, that my love could make you real.

Where did the time go?
I nearly begged my father for more.
So, I gave you all of me.
The serious sides,
But it wasn't enough to settle scores.

It wasn't hard to give away, it was just more that you was searching.
I remembered your smile at me your eyes had made it worth it.
The baby smiled at our world with warmth and so much love.
Held your heart in his hands, promising no matter what, it will be safe in his touch.

Tonight you're alone.
We're all split up, for some reason.
You're back in your room having visions of the park we used to visit.
Where our love was literally made tangible by etchings inside of wood.
Our barks now crumble,
As things no longer seem so good.
"The gradual corrosion of what once was,
And what will never be, again."

-Lij.

The little boy stood up
and dusted the chalk from his knees and wrists
and he admired the drawing on the pavement.
Chalk dust had smeared and danced in the wind
while he looked at his tree and the blue sky behind it.
When another boy, a bigger one rode by
and let his bicycle tire cut through the center.
The boy laughed at the little one
and the little one cried.

The boy drew with careful concentration
and Crayola crayon gripped tightly in his small hand
while he colored in a coloring book to make the unnatural possible.
Another girl laughed and tore his page out
saying that pigs weren’t blue and grass isn’t orange.
Everyone snickered and pointed
and the little boy snatched it back and tossed it into his backpack,
ashamed.

The teenage boy painted carefully across his canvas
and let the blue paint drip like pieces of the sky
as he created the ocean waves and swells
and his classmates laughed at him because he wanted to paint
and not play games and the boy had stopped caring,
had stopped hearing the laughter.

The man hung his canvas on the wall
of a fine and elegant gallery
and people came and stared in awe at his creations
and no one laughed or pointed
and he didn’t feel ashamed.
He only heard praise
and now he was laughing.

She sets fire to everything she touches,
I think as my mind burns.
I can't have anything, she takes it away.
Engulfs it. Entraps it.
Monopolizes it.
I can't have anything of my own.
I am sent spiraling into a retrograde.
Screaming at her to stop
as I try to grab the things out of my
burning house.
"DON'T TOUCH THIS, DON'T TOUCH THIS DON'T TOU--"
Everything she touches turns to ember.
She will ruin everything I love.
I just need to hold on to one thing.
Anything.
She sets fire to everything that is mine!*
My mind burns.
I scramble to save anything I can salvage
as the flames bellow in
and the smoke engulfs the room.
"COME BEFORE THE FIRE GETS TO YOU.
DON'T TOUCH IT, DONT TOUCH IT, DONT TOUCH--"
It's a race between me and the flames
as they dance around the floor, walls,
ceiling.
The room is swallowed in smoke,
and I stagger outside
coughing and swaying.
I can't salvage anything before the entire
house burns down.
I look,
disheartened at the place where
foundation used to be.
Nothing now but rubble and wispy smoke,
knowing this would happen from the beginning.
"Look what she did," I say as I clutch the lighter.

'you have to go to spirit', he said,
'spirit cannot come to you'

if you need to talk,
call the scrap yard.
ask for the girl
who sifts through debris
and finds spare parts
that can try to replace
your failing ones.

I will answer
to whistling teapots
and accumulated newspapers
if you don’t have time to call;
drinking gasoline so I don’t fall asleep,
and oil for stability.

if the things I find
cannot help,
I will relinquish my function
so I don’t fail you too—
the sum of my parts
could never make a whole
as lovely as yours, anyway.