by LJ Frank
When I was younger I always thought
my face in the mirror was just a facsimile of me,
the real me was the one that was doing the looking
so as a balance to the surface of things I grew my mind
and then a recent birthday occurred.
I approached the mirror as if I was forty
while shaving and watching my beard wash down the drain
like past faces never fully reaching their possibility
My lips moved, “I don’t feel like the facsimile in the mirror,”
exercise, vitamins, patronage of a spa, prayers,
crossing a desert, climbing a mountain, bathing in artesian springs,
and being in places too uncertain to process deep thoughts,
experience alters the face as does time,
perhaps I’ll put on my sunglasses and find some beach to walk
and meditate on meanings while the surf chills my feet,
but then evening arrived.
I was visiting an art museum to attend a wine tasting
while sipping a blend of Cabernets’ Sauvignon and Franc
and fingering through my mind’s archive of past lives
I looked up to see someone vaguely familiar
wearing a wide grin below the wrinkles around her eyes
she mentioned she knew me from decades ago
and we kissed the other’s cheek,
an immediate warmth ensued
so we talked as old friends do
and then after our lengthy, intimate conversation
came a blushing realization –
we had really never met each other before
though our faces suggested otherwise
or perhaps it was the contours of a facsimile.