My Reflection Poem by cynthia Routen

Focasing so hard it hurts. Trying to concentrate on the task that's been placed before me. I know now that I've changed and it frightens me deep within. Following this forboding light I travel through an endless night. I'm in search of him once again so he might hold me as I weep. I can see the changes taking place as I look at the unfamiliar face gazing out of that mirror back at me. The woman in the morror cries no tears and in her eyes I see unfaced fears. She's a total mystery. She seems so angry yet her heart is empty, void of anything but fear. I see her dream as she lies so helpless, defenseless in her sleep. She watches him walk out of her life knowing that that wont be the last time. She falls to her knees as sge hears the knews. Crying so much and feeling so lost I gaze at this face I used to know, the one I once called my own and now I wonder if that's truly my reflection.
I try so hard to remember what it was like when I was young, was I happy, was I loved? I feel myself slipping further and further away as my dreams begin to come back to me. There's blood and pain, there's loss without gain and then it always ends the same. I'm in a black dress, my face turned away so no one can see the tears I cry. They come at us, folded flag in hand. Looking at that shining black casket that holds within it my heart and soul, I rise from my seat and step around those brave men in uniform with that damnable flag in their hands. The casket sits dark and perfect against the surrounding sunlit grass. The lid is open and there I expect to see him lieing surrounded by velvet, but instead of my lost love I see my own body in that ring of material. I wake in a cold sweat crying not a single tear but feeling my body shake as I fill with fear. I don't think I'll ever understand the change in my reflection.