Margaret Atwood

During an exchange at lunch today, my co-workers talked about the time Margaret Atwood attended the 2009 Hong Kong Literary Festival as a participant (and of course, I wasn't in Hong Kong back then). I was quite surprised and was all-eared. I recall this poem I loved during high school. In fact, this poem was the reason I held onto the ‘text book’ for so many years. I’ll let you interpret it yourself – here it is for you to enjoy:

Tricks with Mirrors

by Margaret Atwood

i

It’s no coincidence

this is a used

furniture warehouse.

I enter with you

and become a mirror.

Mirrors

are the perfect lovers,

that’s it, carry me up the stairs

by the edges, don’t drop me,

that would be bad luck, 

throw me on the bed

reflecting side up,

fall into me,

it will be your own

mouth you hit, firm and glassy,

your own eyes you find you

are up against   closed   closed

ii

There is more to a mirror

than you looking at

your full-length body 

flawless but reversed,

there is more than this dead blue

oblong eye turned outwards to you.

Think about the frame.

The frame is carved, it is important,

it exists it does not reflect you, 

it does not recede and recede, it has limits

and reflections of its own.

There’s a nail in the back

to hang it with; there are several nails, 

think about the nails,

pay attention to the nail

marks in the wood,

they are important too.

iii

Don’t assume it is passive

or easy this clarity

with which I give you yourself.

Consider what restraint it

takes: breath withheld, no anger

or joy disturbing the surface 

of the ice.

You are suspended in me

beautiful and frozen, I

preserve you, in me you are safe.

It is not a trick either, 

it is a craft:

mirrors are crafty.

iv

I wanted to stop this,

this life flattened against the wall,

mute and devoid of colour, 

built of pure light,

this life of vision only, split

and remote, a lucid impasse.

I confess: this is not a mirror,

it is a door

I am trapped behind.

I wanted you to see me here,

say the releasing word, whatever

that may be, open the wall.

Instead you stand in front of me 

combing your hair.

v

You don’t like these metaphors.

All right:

Perhaps I am not a mirror.

Perhaps I am a pool.

Think about pools.