reflections

Rubbing, fingers crawling down the glass,
pain spreading,
all at once there's nothing there
and yet I see everything.

"What do you see?" she asks.
Reflections, a face and emerald eyes,
desires masked behind a shell
broken dreams dripping off the ceiling.

"I see nothing but you," I say,
to myself, strings forcing lips,
curves unknown to me or you
or so I say today.

Forget tomorrow and after
and the day after that, time
seeps through a tunnel of glass,
floods for 40 days and nights.

"Do you cry a deluge?"
"Only when you're sad."
She smiles suddenly and the tears
threaten to rival time.

"I'm sad now," the voice whispers,
heat blowing in an ear that feels not
staining the frigid glass,
remember, nothing is there.

Just reflections of what we are
who we were, and maybe
what we might be in a thunderstorm
after the lightning strikes.

And then I see everything,
false knowledge at the fingertips,
burning, scratching the window,
past the shell of time.

© copyright 2001