Glass

Glass  

I’ve heard so many fears regarding the mirror. They fear that another person will be in their place. They fear that someone will come out of it, or perhaps drag them into it. They fear what they see, they fear the truth. But I’ve never encountered someone who shares my fear. Perhaps I’m ludicrous, or mad as a hatter. But I know what is real, I can feel it. That fear which makes your heart skip the occasional beat, the fear which sends sporadic shivers down your back, the fear like a tapestry of terror, covering one’s mind in a blanket of madness.  

I look in the mirror, and I see my fear.  

Emptiness.  

Nothing to greet me, no one to affirm my existence.  

I guess it makes sense. Why would glass reflect glass? It doesn’t, and my entire body was made of it. All I desired, was for something to reflect back, something to reassure me that all of this isn’t for naught.  

But it’s empty.  

I walk amongst diamonds, sapphires, emeralds, the entire spectrum of gemstones, all dazzling and radiating with confidence and presence. Some gemstones lose their gleam, but they add polish to keep up their appearances or recut themselves in hopes of combating the tides of time. Some learn to live with it, their wornness becoming part of their beauty.   

There is no one like me, not that I can see. Instead, I attempt to get as close to those fantastical beings, hoping to catch a glimmer of their magnificence in my reflection. Perhaps their reflection could become my own? His arms were perfectly shaped, his muscles like a string of pearls. I would love arms like that. Her face, each feature a gem in a deposit of riches. I would love to have a face like that. His body, shaped like a gorgeous diamond, each angle more perfect than the next. I would love a body like that.  

But no matter how often I attempt to absorb their reflection, loan their parts, I never obtain them. Instead, I’m an empty shell without shape or form.  

And so, I live in fear, of the mirror, of myself.  

Perhaps I did fear the truth? The truth of my being.  

I am nothing.  

No one.  

Everyone else, is a breathtaking gemstone.  

And I lack everything they are.  

They say, diamonds are made under pressure, but what about glass? I fear, most of all, that the pressure will not crystalize me, it will break me.  

And am I not broken enough already?