Bronze Mirror of the Ice Maiden

22.4.97

My mirror set in wood
and guarded by the doe
the doe I carry into stories
into history I tell
is placed beside me in the log
its red cloth case protecting
til I should need its magic
its glitter into where I wander

In autumn's icy wind we found
we found our little house
still waiting as we left it in the spring
The yurts around all gathered families
as - cobwebs cleared - I sat
to weave the telling of the season
and the hardships we had suffered
into richness of our tribal story

And sometimes in the mirror glitter
I can see the times before
the times before I lived
or down the camel line
the oldest gaffer dreamed about
I can see the pictures
of the stories I still tell
which story-ancestors related

The great-great-grandmother of this one
first told the tale I told you yesterday
and that old gaffer's mother
was a legendary power
whose imagination still entwines
with every story I remember
and who saw the anguish of that winter
when the wolves descended

In my mirror I can see
serenity of swans in summer
where the trees in lower pasture
march around the Mirror of the Moon
foretelling richness in the birthing season
gentle winters on the steppe
when no-one but the oldest dies
and stories feed the flame about the fire

copyright 1997 Charlotte Peters Rock

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