There it is again, the desire
to be somewhere but here,
the hope to find the self in a different room
with a different face and a different
spine, a different once upon. But we
are always ourselves. And it’s never
gotten us there before, this brittle map
to Elsewhere with its thousands of folds,
its distorted compass rose.
Nope. It’s never taken us even an inch
away from wherever we are. Always here.
Though we squint, or heck, even change
the narrator to second person, no matter:
the room you are in is the room you are in,
and it is still your face you see in the mirror
whether you want to recognize it or not.