This afternoon at half-past three
I saw myself as I made tea
Through the bright, distinctive bend
Of a coffee spoon’s back end.
The word I use is not ‘reflection’
Rather some kind of projection
Of a person yet to blossom
Like a cracking boll of cotton.
Grinning, silver-gilded through
The cutlery— as spectres do—
Appeared myself at fifty-five
Devoid of life but quite alive.
My contemporary body
(The corporeal and un-contorted)
Shuddered at the impure image
Of this frightful, fated visage.
Why should I start, if such a face
Would— in two scores— be commonplace?
Has he not lived my lives foreseen?
Do I not yearn for where he’s been?
Through the flatware, our fates merging
All his history’s roads diverging
Avenues of self-expression,
Glamour; lust— tasteful obsession.
I marvelled at his paths’ pearlescence
All potential gains and lessons
Before me, slews of selves refracting
To prismatic smithereens.
Perhaps I would be better suited
To a life seated and suited.
Thoughts on tap but thinking muted—
Madcap dreams left spayed and neutered.