Mirror mirror on the wall.

There is such a thing as a faulty mirror. Not a mirror that merely distorts shapes a bit or a lot. These ones we know about: concave, convex, we have seen them before in funfairs and they cannot trick us anymore. Back in forty-eight, Orson Welles had them tamed already.

Sometimes they are not intentionally fancy, just… cheap. These ones, you might want to try and get tricked by. We had one of them in London. That mirror was reflecting the house of long and thin model students. The cheap reduced-to-clear diet had no effect on these guys.

No. Here I am talking truly faulty mirror. One that does not reflect the correct image. It is unclear where it picks it up from but one thing for sure, it is not not from whom who faces it.

Mind you, some mirrors are diligent. Take the one from your workplace. You’d meet it in the morning, when you have just arrived and need to wash your hands because your bicycle chain came off again or quickly check your hair as it is so windy today. This one does just fine. Your hair is neat and glossy, skin fresh, make up spotless. The morning sun adds a touch of grace and makes you so worth it. And the mirror captures it just fine.

However, try the mirror down your workplace local pub on a Friday night. This one gets it all wrong. Every single time. At least it’s consistent. You leave work, go for a drink and normally need the toilet at one point or another. Up to that moment you were rather jolly, having a good untroubled time. That’s precisely when you have to meet that vile mirror. Your face is that of roast chicken, your nose could easily lead French boats over a stormy North Sea, and you look like an exhausted racoon losing its pretend human shape (minus the stretchy balls).

You turn around but you’re alone in the room, it’s not someone else’s reflection you mistook for yours. The mirror is really pretending that is you. The lighting is not so good here but you couldn’t righteously blame so much on it. It could be a prank mirror which is really a screen displaying the results of an elaborate real time hag algorithm, but that seems a bit expensive. Besides, there couldn’t be any electrical equipment allowed in the restroom for health and safety reasons. Then…it has got to a portal to another dimension very much like our world. Only over there, people look terribly unhealthy. Mmmh, no, not very plausible. Surely they would be some lag.

In that case I can only see one explanation: mirrors simply get tired. It all ties in. The one from work just had a long quiet night, and for sure it gets breaks throughout the day. Why would it keep on reflecting if no one’s here to appreciate? Work bathrooms never get so busy, people are usually not very inclined to linger there. Therefore, those mirrors get plenty of rest and they can easily be sharp and zealous when you walk in. But the pub one on a Friday night must be exhausted with all those back and forth of pint drinkers. When you think about it, you never look so bad when you go for a quick drink on a weekday or for team lunch. It’s always on Fridays.

It must be such hard work scrutinizing and mimicking all those details. You have to understand colour, motion, acting, physics, light bounces… You need to analyze and assimilate every single detail, then seamlessly reproduce each to perfection. My… no wonder they wear themselves out.

So we got to the bottom of it, what to do about it now? Maybe I should talk to the pub owners and get them to swap mirrors halfway through the evening. I can very well understand the poor mirror is having a hard time but that’s doesn’t justify the groundless concerns inflicted to blameless customers either.

Le petit chaperon vert.

Il était une fois une petite fille de village, qui vivait avec sa mère non loin d’une forêt. Leur maison, en réalité, se trouvait à l’écart du village et tout autour n’était que vertes plaines et buttes tapissées d’herbes folles. Fille unique, elle avait grandi sans autres enfants alentour. Ils l’impressionnaient lorsqu’elle les rencontrait les jours de marché et elle les trouvait bruyants et par bien trop remuants. Elle avait pour amis les animaux de la ferme: elle faisait classe aux lapins, coursait les poules et chantait des comptines aux chevreaux, mais ses jeux favoris se déroulaient au cœur des prés. Se roulant dans les herbes hautes pour les aplatir, elle aménageait ainsi des châteaux composés de nombreuses pièces et d’interminables couloirs. Elle dévalait les buttes en s’interdisant de ralentir et en s’efforçant de rester sur ses pieds, ou parfois les roulait à dessein. Elle recensait les fleurs et chaque soir en offrait un petit bouquet à sa chère mère. Bien qu’attendrie, celle-ci désespérait souvent de voir son enfant rentrer ravie mais maculée de taches. Un jour, elle lui confectionna un petit chaperon vert à porter lorsqu’elle irait jouer dans les herbes. L’enfant l’affectionnait tant qu’elle le portait en tout circonstance, si bien que partout on l’appelait le Petit Chaperon vert.

Un jour, sa mère, ayant cuit et fait des galettes, lui dit : Va voir comme se porte ta mère-grand, car on m’a dit qu’elle était malade. Porte-lui une galette et ce petit pot de beurre. Le Petit Chaperon vert partit aussitôt pour aller chez sa mère-grand, qui demeurait dans un autre village. En traversant la forêt, elle rencontra le loup. Fort affamé, celui-ci l'aurait bien dévorée aussitôt, cependant il craignait la présence des bûcherons que l’on entendait travailler non loin. Innocemment, il engageât la conversation. Où te rends tu ainsi à travers bois en cette belle journée? Ma pauvre Mère-grand est malade, je lui apporte une galette que lui a cuit ma mère ce matin, ainsi qu’un petit pot de beurre. Quelle bonne enfant tu fais, s’exclama le loup. Habite-t-elle donc loin ? En effet, lui répondit le Petit Chaperon vert. Je dois encore passer cette clairière puis la rivière et sa maison se trouve ensuite au-delà du moulin. Et bien et bien, belle enfant, j’admire ton dévouement. Si tu le souhaites, je te tiendrai compagnie et viendrai la saluer. Pauvre bonne femme, je le savais pas malade, et j’en suis bien désolé.

Le Petit Chaperon vert, qui aimait beaucoup sa Mère-grand, se réjouit qu’un de ses amis lui rende également visite. Habituée aux doux animaux de la ferme, la belle enfant ne pouvait se douter des terribles intentions du vilain loup. En chemin elle fût intarissable, lui posant mille questions sur la forêt, qu’elle connaissait assez peu, s’arrêtant pour examiner les fleurs qui lui étaient inconnues et battant des mains à la vue des écureuils qui bondissaient de branche en branche. Le loup commençait à perdre patience mais demeurait prudent à l’idée des bûcherons encore trop proches. Cependant, les coups de hache ne se s’étant fait entendre depuis quelques temps déjà, il s’apprêta à bondir sur le Petit Chaperon vert. À cet instant même elle stoppa net et s’écria d’une voie aigüe : Oh, loup, approche ! Regarde cette jolie descente! Voyons qui de nous deux arrivera le premier. Es-tu prêt ? Partons à trois ! Pris de cours et craignant que les cris du Petit Chaperon vert n’aient pu attirer l’attention, le loup n’eût d’autre choix que de se prêter au jeu.

Au signal, tous deux se lancèrent du même pas, mais sur ses quatre pattes le loup la distança presque immédiatement. Grisé par cette course, arrivant au bas de la butte il se retourna prêt à bondir pour enfin la dévorer mais ce faisant, il ne vit la racine d’un gros chêne qui le fit trébucher. Entraîné par son élan il continua de rouler à vive allure pour terminer violemment sa course en chutant contre un large tronc. Le Petit Chaperon vert, en larme, porta le loup inconscient chez sa Mère-grand. Lorsque celle-ci fût rétablie, elle pansa les blessures du loup bien mal en point qui progressivement recouvrit ses forces mais jamais ses esprits. C’est ainsi qu’elle devint la seule Mère-grand du pays à posséder un loup de garde.

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Back home.

October cows, resting in the dark

do you really like horse chestnuts?

Shadows of fur upon shadows of grass, they are watching

over the river Cam.

Cycles whizzing past,

streaks of reds or streaks of whites

it is not the time for a courtly ride

along the river Cam.

White stains of still swans

a gathered herd of marine sheeps

so bright in the moonlight they hover

above the river Cam

At night the river Cam gets bored of staying in bed.

in a myriad of herself she plunges into the air.

with thousands of chirpy eyes

she peeps in the streets and the parks.

When she is contented she will rest on the blades 

and let herself slide down to bed.

6

Vous reprendrez une tranche d’automne ?

Le ciel blanc s’étend sans fin, intemporel,

impassible surface dont le mutisme oppresse.

Il pèse sur les nuques, sa charge est un appel

à la résignation quand l’espoir nous délaisse.

Pareil au froid baiser de la reine des neiges,

cet horizon figé nous enlève à nous même.

Éteignant les regards, il instaure un long siège

qui rend les cœurs exsangues et les visages blêmes.

Aux branches chancelantes, chétives, les feuilles tremblent,

Et à terre le brouillard avidement réclame

tout contour tout essor, c’est ainsi qu’il me semble

qu’en me quittant mon ombre a emporté mon âme.

Les couleurs alourdies prêtes à se retirer

sont déjà alanguies : l’automne s’est installé.

Just one more minute!

Every morning I’m late. Not terribly badly so, technically I’m not even late but I’m certainly at least a tinsy later than I wish I was. And yet it always starts rather fine. I wake up very easily, jump out of bed and I’m instantly awake and functional. No time wasted there. Breakfast, hair, teeth, make up… It’s all well and good until suddenly I check the time and it has gone. I’m two minutes over while I should be on my bike already.

At that point I still have to perform all the minor actions which are normally neglected when it comes to scheduling how long you need to leave home. Picking up your shoes, maybe rummaging in the shoe box to find the right pair for today. Grabbing your keys, maybe checking all your pockets from yesterday’s jacket to try and find them, or maybe you bag, or maybe  behind that goddamn recycle-ready piece of advertising on the kitchen shelf that was hiding them. Dumping the said piece of advertising in the recycling bin. (KIDS EAT FREE! 2 Free Personal Pizzas when you buy a Large Pizza* at regular menu price. *Excludes cheese & tomato. Not valid with any other offer: please mention when ordering. Pizza from the menu or create your own up to 4 toppings. Expires 21st October 2012.) Going back to the bedroom to check if the window is indeed closed. Most times it is, sometimes it’s not, you definitely will have to double check again tomorrow. Once at the door again, retracing your steps back to the bedroom to get the keys you’ve just abandoned somewhere on the way. Wrapping up the fresh bread in a bag so it doesn’t dry over the course of the morning. Slipping in your shoes, optionally lacing them up, locking the back door. Getting your bike out of the shed, closing the shed door, making sure you actually locked the house back door, putting on your gloves, getting your bike out the garden, closing the door, removing one glove, struggling with the hidden garden door bolt, hop on your bike and at last, start pedalling away. With luck spending a minute putting back in place your chain that has just came off again and cursing yourself for still not having fixed or replaced your bicycle. Yet knowing you’re still not going to do anything about it for weeks if not month but grabbing new plastic gloves from the petrol station to not dirty your hands as you daily put the chain back in place. Variations are infinite.

Nevermind. So we know about the last five to ten minutes: we certainly know where that time has gone. But what about just before? How does time jump to forty seven past with no warning? It has to be some insidious reason, something cunning must be operating on the sly. Ten minutes can’t disappear at once and their absence come unnoticed. For months did I seek for an explanation, always alert and on the lookout… but my investigations remained unfruitful. Until I felt it. A slight pinch, a hint of a hiccup, a wee little shiver. That very one time, one of them was not cautious enough and let me feel it. I didn’t notice it at that time, or rather it was so insignificant I barely recorded it. Immediately I forgot about it. But sensations live through you more than you realize, so the next time it happened I was able to recognize it. Gradually I learnt to identify it.

It’s so faint it’s hard to describe. It would be something like a light rain on a skylight. The slightest drizzle you could imagine, barely heavier than fog, just enough for gravity to come into play… but continuous. You could hardly hear it over your own breath, that’s how they do it. One second at a time, they steal time from you. What is a second after all? How would do even notice? Still…one second after another a whole lifetime unfolds. They take care of the pennies and the pounds take care of themselves.

When I think about it, being one of them I would surely do the same. When your lifespan expectancy peaks at thirty days, no wonder you try to expand it. Especially when seconds seem so meaningless to a being who’s going to live for ninety years or so. That's such a harmless misdeed. Besides, the operation is pretty much risk free: human beings don’t pay attention to midges. We just wave them away when they fly at our faces too insistently.

And yet… Yet our faces wrinkle and age, one second at a time.