Mirror

You used to rehearse in the mirror as I'd wait,

filling in your skin from the bed.

If I could give a name

to each muscle

as I uncover you

traversing the landscape of your skin,

would that give you

the definition

you need

to feel whole?

Is it external assurance

that confines you to this frame

an absence of form

unmade within this fragile trace

of framework undone by a single thread

followed poorly through the cracks

of a labyrinth formed over a lifetime

with locked doors at your center

or are you more

than a man in fixed glass?

Should I count each proportion

according to Canon

that you possess

to quantify sustainable beauty?

Would you believe me then?

Your body is a tool

to be oiled,

sharpened + used,

& mine, a vessel

a printed rendering to be filled

& you seek value in the powerful

where I need only seek your eyes

containing worlds within them

where I can find new life

& though you left

you were never far from me

& though I was here

you took me with you through the wilderness

that is the unknown of calm reproach

of a mind too eager to be confined

as our story became a faded old rose still in bloom amidst fallen branches that ache beneath the weight of thorns exhumed by pressure + time.