ξένος

The Stranger:

Moonlight cold

and untouchable

like mercury

cascades through

an open window 

to the mirror.

Who is staring at me

in the glass

with my own eyes?

How many years

I evaded

their gaze

favoring the darkest,

obscurest waters,

rain-muddled rivers,

the cracking

windowpanes

of fractured sleep.

I heard my footsteps 

as though they were 

another’s

haunting me no end

in dreams

where I’m lost

in a labyrinth,

chased through sleep

in frenzied circles.

Now the moon wells up—

silvery rivulets

in the mirror.

The stranger emerges

over and over

out of the glass.

Melissánthi.