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Dusame in the Mirror 

   by Ssal Nogard

In a land deep of reflection 

stands a mirror of perfection.

In it sees the soul’s subjection 

clearly against all objection 

       hardened into stone. 

There sits a maiden, sometimes standing

all within her view commanding 

vast and wide an understanding 

       of sights seen in the glass.

Through the mirror fair she looks, 

stealing thoughts, akin a crook;

with a glance she never brooks 

       the edges of the glass.

This creature lady has a ken

that sees the ills within and when

she sees the ills it comes forth ten

       more thousand fold as hard.

The mirror looks for her instead 

of her own eyes, to which it fed

forbidden sights behind her--led

her to such things as she would wed 

       fastly to her eyes. 

But if a look into this glass

from any eyes besides the lass, 

of verdant hair and eyes that pass 

   the gleaming of the moon, 

Would see the same as in a plain 

made looking glass. And so contain 

nothing of the brass insane-

       ness thrashing to look out. 

Through days that spun of languid splendor 

Ceaseless grew her glassly wonder. 

Could not god and could not thunder 

take her glass and her asunder. 

      

~~~~~*******~~~~~*****~~~~~~~~~~~~~****~~~~~

Her sisters two at least as fair 

Gorgons both: the immortal hair 

that flamed by day and slunk through lair, 

by night, of green and serpent rare 

       The sisters of Dusame. 

They had the hair, they had the flame 

but never did they look the same. 

They’d not her eyes and could not blame 

     the shadows in the glass. 

Why so for one who sits and sees

by glass while two can look with ease 

at sights delightful as they please… 

For she was never on her knees,

and so she never could appease

her gods with prayer or small decrees

of sycophantish, squealing pleas.

For triflings none, she wanted ease

on par with that of this and these

immortals flying in the breeze.

But to the gods she paid no fees

and so she sits with their disease

       for never needing them. 

Thus, by day was changed a girling, 

solid skin and all-a-curling, 

hair that shivered, and a-pearling

       eyes that shone a shade of sterling,

Hardness more and hardness yearning

       bleakly for a break.

As such the mortal in her showed

no greater in her glass abode,

where all she sat and oft was told

of things not hers nor to behold.

Yet in the corner of her eye 

her sisters dance until they cry 

of things so lovely yonder high! 

and things so holy yonder nigh--

that from her lips she slips a sigh

       of things she cannot see. 

~~~**~~~***~~~~~~~~~~~~**~~~~~~~~~~~

They come to see the sisters three,

heroic with a certainty,

that in their curse they bear gladly

are free to wave most luridly

at suitors all who fast decree 

to slay the sisters famously.

It never ends this way, only

more turned to granite cruelly

not from fate but intensity

of finding more and differently.

Two steps forward, whistling lowly 

He has come to see the holy 

of the Gorgons, changing solely 

       at the break of eve. 

He sits to see the fair Dusame,

whose beauty deep is known by name.

Whoever so could win a claim

of sight and hair and so her tame,

yet live through such a ghoulish game

of sight, hair, and forbidden frame.

He catches sight far in the glass 

seductive lines and heinous mass

of things unseen, he lets it pass-- 

       those moments in her eyes. 

Her sisters smiling, sidling close 

to see their pilgrim and to boast… 

Instantly she turned a ghost 

       of shadows and of sighs. 

Dusame had seen him by the way 

and she had wanted him to lay 

his hand upon her---but she stayed 

and in her struggle did she sway 

       so that she nearly looked. 

Dared not to look, or even turn 

her body sick. A shudder yearned,

and in the instant that she spurned 

his call, it tripled her to burn

       still harder in the glass.  

~~****~~~*****~~~~~~******~~~~~~*****~~~~~****~~~~~

And when the sun spit shriveled rays, 

Her hair turned in a vastly maze 

of dark and emerald ablaze 

that met none of her awesome gaze-- 

        chimera called Dusame. 

And the mirror shines a clearer 

glow, and clearer with the sheerer 

lines of things outlined and nearer, 

made over big and over dearer 

       to the watcher called Dusame. 

How can she look and make him stone, 

her gaze that blights through look alone

from lightened eyes and depths they shone, 

       blazed into hard reflection. 

Looked through the glass but for a flash, 

He lifted sword and made to slash 

her slender throat a deep red gash 

       and saw her look away. 

She looked a look of guileless peer,

reflection and a window clear 

both of soul and desire dear. 

       She looked him through and back. 

He lowered blade and fought to spy

the wonder in the glassy eye 

but knew that look that would belie

the tendency to magnify 

       what was within the glass. 

“Your look is one of death,” he said 

and for this man would have your head. 

I cannot deviate my stead 

       fast intent to run you red.” 

“My look is death,” she said, “if only 

in your shadowed, dank and lonely 

crevices you speak--atone! Be 

       sorry--of things… ungod.” 

“Then all,” he said, “no doubt succumb

Better to be struck mute and dumb 

in mind and soul and so in sum 

       than risk a thought that strays. 

“And you Dusame, how do you fit 

into this frame you never quit 

so calmly do you peer and sit 

       extracting our misdeeds” 

“I sit unscathed as I can do no

wrong or right and thus I grow 

no further than my frame and so

I sit and dream of things I know

       not of and wish I did 

                                    --a little.” 

       sighed the sad Dusame.

On bended knee he took her hand

and gave her tears that rifely ran 

and seared her skin like desert sand,

       blinding her to see. 

Her eyes grew wide, her hair died lank 

she gazed at him once more and sank 

her head onto the mirror’s bank 

       and gazed at it no more. 

He lifted her and turned her face;, 

unseeing kissed her eyes with haste 

and set her back onto the chaste 

     smooth surface of the mirror.

He sheathed his blade, and set to go, 

his body limp and hanging low, 

in desolation for a foe 

who was not--And, will never know 

that he saw her more clearly thro’ 

       the eye glass of Dusame. 

And yet he steals her stony gaze 

cast from the glass to surely raze

The look, once seen, it always stays 

      the mortal called Dusame. 

~*~*~*~**~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~**~*~*~*~**~*~*~*~*~*~**~
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