The One in the Mirror

...an autobiographical poem from "Diary of the Falling Dominoes" ... by Harlon Rivers

There is someone in the mirror

I can’t recognize

Although it seems like

there are eerie familiarities

I used to know by 

heart... 

There have been so many changes;

You win some and you lose

Recognition feels like trying to identify 
an unknown face, 
from behind an impossible mask ...

All the ships that sailed away

all the here and nows ... that came and went

Those hollow eyes look scarred and tagged

by the salty tears of what they've past

Crow’s-feet are growing more vivid 
with each aching heart's opine...

Lines extend back from the corners 

Rooted deeply in an unrecognizable evolving 

mind ... 

Fingers fumble about these dark circled reflections

Nervously… smudging a fingerprint's smear of haziness

As if the face were a paint by number self portrait

The color number for the shade required is called 
pain ...

In this long glance ~ 

… Déjà vu …

“Your faded memory 
is beginning to come back to me”...

“Yes you’re the one that’s uncomfortable in here”

“The one who can’t stand crawling

inside of my own skin”…

2012 Harlon Rivers