STONING THE MIRROR
Moon River Estates, January 4, 2011
I wrote this poem on the evening of January 4, 2011, as Sara Schmidt and I were discussing people who accuse us of the very things they are guilty of. It is as though we hold a mirror up to them and they mistake their image for us. I was reminded of these words from the Lord through Isaiah:
Isaiah 30:8-14 ESV
(8) And now, go, write it before them on a tablet and inscribe it in a book, that it may be for the time to come as a witness forever.
(9) For they are a rebellious people, lying children, children unwilling to hear the instruction of the LORD;
(10) who say to the seers, “Do not see,” and to the prophets, “Do not prophesy to us what is right; speak to us smooth things, prophesy illusions,
(11) leave the way, turn aside from the path, let us hear no more about the Holy One of Israel.”
(12) Therefore thus says the Holy One of Israel, “Because you despise this word and trust in oppression and perverseness and rely on them,
(13) therefore this iniquity shall be to you like a breach in a high wall, bulging out and about to collapse, whose breaking comes suddenly, in an instant;
(14) and its breaking is like that of a potter’s vessel that is smashed so ruthlessly that among its fragments, not a shard is found with which to take fire from the hearth, or to dip up water out of the cistern.”
STONING THE MIRROR
Mirror, mirror, on the wall
Wherever did you get your gall?
I’m not guilty of such things at all
Mirror, mirror, take a fall!
I have a different image in my mind
Of myself that’s much more kind
A finer person you’ll never find
Surely, mirror, you are blind!
Mirror, mirror, full of lies
What you show me, I despise
What I see, my heart denies
A sight not fit for holy eyes! Ooh ooh oo… Boo hoo hoo…
Who holds this mirror before my face?
I find your judgment cruel and base
Is your agenda my disgrace?
You need to learn and know your place.
I will now even the score
I’ll destroy what I abhor
Crash goes the mirror to the floor
A false impression to give no more. Ooh, ooh, oo… Boo hoo hoo…
But now I have only shattered dreams
There’s no more peace, it seems
Only eyes full of beams
A state no decent being esteems.
INTERLUDE
Mirror, mirror on the wall
Will I be sorry I missed your call?
Were you speaking truth after all?
Will I ever walk straight and tall?
Mirror, mirror on the wall,
Will I be sorry I missed your call?
Were you speaking truth, after all?
Will I evvver walk… straight and tall? BGVs oh oh oh oh
Oooooh… BGVs oh oh oh oh
Mirror, mirror… on… the wall.
Victor Hafichuk
January 4, 2011; the last stanza added August 2020.