From one day to the next, I never know
when the face will show itself again
in a mirror or a pan of water,
as if unearthed by the ceaseless, circling
plough of my mind. It’s always the same;
a happy, younger me, long gone,
the dead returned to speak with the dying.
I wonder if he understands me,
as I don’t understand him.
As we stare at each other
across the abyss, he fades to watery thinness
and so do I, from one day to the next.
(from Temptation in the Desert, Agàpe Publications, 2002)
S.C. Flynn 