Mirror

Mirror

In the mirror of my country
I see the self I’m swift becoming,
dogged by denial, cynical and numb,
worn thin with fear about accounts unbalanced
and teetering twenty years in the future
when I am old but unready and the choices 
will be at their most harrowing.

In the mirror of my country
I see the shadow of death,
escaped from its valley and roaming
free in the background, just behind my graying reflection.
It is now acceptable, even welcome company
and only vestigial visceral dread sustains
what once was called 
love of life.

When the language of our leaders
and our erstwhile digital pals
and our neighbors with their garage doors closing
renders Armageddon with such juicy fluency,
it is hard not to hear ourselves read into the script
and see ourselves in the frame,
motionless and compliant
and waiting for the end.

Who speaks these words
of blustering estrangement 
from other humans, other nations,
other habits of mind and body?

Who postures, playing influencer,
shooting craps with souls on the line,
unaware that the loss is inevitably our own?
Why do I feel the cold of the dice
in my own hand?

In the mirror of my country 
I am looking at my lips downturned,
my gaze flat and unfriendly 
and filled with loathing, not for the country I see
but for the self that cannot rouse itself
to do
something.

I cannot see a way out from the mirror of my country,
and among my many fears is 
the possibility, strong in sense and scent,
that this is me.

– Greg Blake Miller, April 7, 2026