Mirrors; A Sestina

The mirror, hidden, reveals no truth

Light and shadow dance a twin reflection

Tell me, oh self, what is it that you see?

The fear in you is the fear in me

Locked like secrets in cold, unforgiving glass

And the angles, they always stop to conceal

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Magicians hide what you cannot see

Their mirrors make mirages into simple truth

If silver is not real, then neither is glass

Only barriers that cage reflection

But that which they conceal

The fear in you is the fear in me?

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People see nothing but their own reflection

Half fantasies, half lies, half glass

The mist is a queen, whose crown is to conceal

Blurring edges and thoughts, so you cannot see

The fear in you is the fear in me

And there is little world left in the truth

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If you smash the mirror, you can feel the glass

Open your eyes and tell me that you see

That the fear in you is the fear in me

Reality can protect and half secrets conceal

Smoke rising can lose its bitter truth-

There is no known reflection

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The fear in you is the fear in me

And though conjurers try to conceal

The fine line between the fantastic and the truth

It becomes thin, and fragile like bones made of glass

Nothing remains but an unearthly reflection

I realize it is myself that I see

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Mirrors lie, angles conceal

The fear in you is the fear in me

Thrown off by some bloody and false reflection

What it shows is never the truth

And it is always the falsehood that I see

I can only give myself to the glass

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You cannot, in a mirror, find truth

Reflection and desperation is what you will see

That, and the fear in you is the fear in me