Street Scene

I have learned to pass

the mirrors lurking in the storefronts

without looking.

One fed-back slice of life

cuts through pedestrian security

and traps the eye I am

each time I eye myself alone

in public view.

The child who dreaded stepping on the cracks

grows up avoiding glassy looks.

No vaccine lessens the adult paralysis

of being irrevocably made

in one's own ghastly image.

But this tells little of the longer tale

the lifetime role to strut

or sneak across the mirror-stage

of queasy self-acknowledgment.