One Poem by Hiromi Yoshida

 

Mirror 

 

Her large grey eyes, widening 

her red mouth, a 

perfect rosebud, opening— 

gold tints rippling throughout her auburn hair 

restrained beneath a 

demure Puritan cap; Her 

 

own beauty was the forbidden 

Fruit of Knowledge 

because her parents were loath to witness the viper of vanity slither into her 

      innocent heart. No mirrors were permitted in their cottage, nor other 

 

reflecting surfaces. She was 

tasked with scouring the pewter plates that reflected 

nothing, but the grey sullen dawn.    After all, 

 

she was told that if she saw her own face, 

she would die.       She 

 

gathered wild roses to press their withering 

petals between secret book covers, 

 

gazing into brooks whose surface images rippled away— 

into the foaming oblivion of rapids smoothing stones, 

soothing naiads.     Blood 

 

red moon months crept on—stones beneath the brook’s 

dull surface fuzzy with moss—the sepia bookmarks of wild roses falling 

from their correct places           till tombstones loomed before her— 

 

the bones of her mother and father crumbled 

beneath the hard soil, while she kept scouring the pewter plates, her 

 

arms sinking into grey suds, and the backside of spoons reflecting back 

her ballooning head, a silly skull.

Hiromi Yoshida - Author of two full-length poetry collections and five poetry chapbooks, Hiromi Yoshida is a finalist for the New Women’s Voices Poetry Prize, and a semi-finalist for the Gerald Cable Book Award. While serving as a poetry reader for Flying Island Journal, she coordinates the Last Sunday Poetry reading series for the Writers Guild at Bloomington. She has been intrigued by fairy tales and Gothic stories since she was as little as Red Riding Hood.