UNDER THE CIRCLE OF MIRRORS
square compacts,
round ones,
some blue enameled,
the powder worn
less than the
lines around the
woman's face
standing in front
of the dark wood
hardly able to say
what she might have
more easily before he
left. She poses
as whoever wore a
ridge in the powder
might have, studying a
pose, trying out a
phase or a way
of looking as
if trying to get
back a part she
played and nearly lost
to some understudy
before being booked
again. What stretches
behind her, a book
yanked from her arms
she's about to
start again,
astonished at the
grey in her curls,
the face of a stranger
frowning at her,
someone she might have
tried to get back
to but didn't like mail
left unanswered so long
the untouched envelopes
have their own life,
their own terrain