I look in the mirror
I see the face that I have always seen
The same brown eyes
The same bushy eyebrows now speckled with gray
It’s a face that I know
It’s a face that seems the same
It has changed over time
There’s less hair and more gray
Wrinkle lines across the forehead
And around the eyes
Much fuller around the jowls
With dark circles under the eyes
Even though I see these changes
I still see the person I think that I am
I still see the person that lives in my head
There is nothing objective in what I see
I see the person that I want to be
I see the person I fear that I am
Others tell me they see a change
Others tell me that I am not the same
That the person they see today
Is not the person they knew before
The whole of my being seems different to them
As evidence of something happening within
I look even harder to see what they see.
My mind can’t perceive this difference in me
Too much has happened up to this point
I am too used to not noticing
How the inside shapes the outer
How what is seen is more than a face
My soul sings a song of freedom new found
My spirit soars like a bird released from its cage
My heart opens up like a blossoming flower
My mind still questions all that goes on
But I hear a voice telling me to let go
A voice that says the past is only a fading dream
Awake in the moment to what is real
Arise and move forward to walk a new path
Refreshed and renewed to begin a new day
Resurrected from what was before
Recreated to become who you are
Celebrating where you are right now
I look at my face in the mirror
By all appearances, it looks the same
There’s a light in those eyes
That shines like a flame
The flames of a phoenix rising anew
To new life and new love--never the same.
