Ebony and Crystal/Mirrors

by Clark Ashton Smith

MIRRORS

Mirrors of steel or silver, gold or glass antique!Whether in melancholy marble palacesIn some long trance you drew the dreamy lovelinessOf Roman queens, or queens barbarical, or Greek;Or, further than the bright and sun-pursuing beakOf argosy might fare, beheld the empresssesOf lost Lemuria; or behind the latticesAlhambran, have returned forbidden smiles oblique

Of wan, mysterious women!—Mirrors, mirrors old,Mirrors immutable, impassable as Fate,Your bosoms held the perished beauty of the pastNearer than straining love might ever hope to hold;And fleeing faces, lips too phantom-frail to last,Found in your magic depth a life re-duplicate.