Polishing the Mirror

  from Walled Gardens
  
  In time
      we are no longer
  testing the arguments
  that our experience
  will somehow
      make us stronger
  as if each pang of hunger
  itself were sustenance,
  as if the circumstance
  of age could
      make us younger.
   
  No more this
      vain pretending
  our skin gets tougher when
  we feel reality
      burn like the sun.
  We are born to suffer and
  bear our mortality;
  there will be
      no happy ending
  before this
      day is done.
 
 But this too
      is from the sun:
  a secondary fire cast
  from rippling waters,
  a flashing picture
  of the waters’ movement
      brushed upon the wall,
  and you start to see that
  everything is a mirror
  of a higher power
      of aboriginal light;
 
  But this too
      is from the sun:
  the bent reflection
  of passing souls
  on a dagger’s face
  whose verging angle
  and sharpened edge
      turn angels into devils,
  and you let your dagger
  talk to you, but it
  never tells you
  what is true
      or what is false.
 
 In time
      all secondary
  images turn to gray,
  stealing the light of day
  and leaving
      ordinary
  impressions on the mirror
  of our mortality,
  yet we may never see
  a time when
      truth shines clearer.
   
  No more this
      disregarding
  what keeps our darkened hearts
  strong: each determined beat
      comes from the sun,
  and every spark imparts
  the sun’s eternity
  of truth that
      keeps on burning
  after the
      day is done.
 
  And this too
      is from the sun.