MIRROR

https://youtu.be/oFsRdg6co1c

Summary

In this poem, a mirror describes its existence and its owner, who grows older as the mirror watches.

The mirror first describes itself as “silver and exact.” It forms no judgments, instead merely swallowing what it sees and reflecting that image back without any alteration. The mirror is not cruel, “only truthful.” It considers itself a four-cornered eye of a god, which sees everything for what it is.

Most of the time, the mirror looks across the empty room and meditates on the pink speckled wall across from it. It has looked at that wall for so long that it describes the wall as “part of my heart.” The image of the wall is interrupted only by people who enter to look at themselves and the darkness that comes with night.

The mirror imagines itself as a lake. A woman looks into it, trying to discern who she really is by gazing at her reflection. Sometimes, the woman prefers to look at herself in candlelight or moonlight, but these are “liars” because they mask her true appearance. Only the mirror (existing here as lake) gives her a faithful representation of herself.

Because of this honesty, the woman cries and wrings her hands. Nevertheless, she cannot refrain from visiting the mirror over and over again, every morning. Over the years, the woman has “drowned a young girl” in the mirror, and now sees in her reflection an old woman growing older by the day. This old woman rises toward her out of the mirror like “a terrible fish.”

(a) What is the poetic device used when the mirror says 'I swallow'?

Ans  ‘I swallow’ personifies the mirror. The mirror seems to say that the image on it is deep enough to swallow everything, passively. The objectivity of the mirror is significant.

(b) How does the mirror usually pass its time?

Ans  The mirror usually passes its time by constantly looking at the wall opposite to it.

(c) What disturbs the mirror's contemplation of the opposite wall?

Ans. People's faces and the darkness disturb the mirror's contemplation of the opposite

          wall.

(d) Why does the mirror appear to be a lake in the second stanza? What aspect of the mirror do you think is being referred to here?

Ans. The mirror appears to be lake in the second stanza because it has also the quality of reflecting the image of what appears before it like a lake. As whatever falls on the surface of the lake is drowned into it, the mirror also swallows whatever it sees. A new dimension, depth, is being referred here.

(e) What is the woman searching for in the depths of the lake? 

Ans. The woman is searching for her lost youth, charm and beauty in the depths of the

         lake.

(f) How does the narrator convey the fact that the woman looking at her reflection in the lake is deeply distressed?

Ans. The narrator conveys the fact that woman is deeply distressed because when she sees herself ageing in the mirror, she turns away to find her answers in the candles and the moon. She has tears in her eyes and her agitated hands express her distress.

(g) What makes the woman start crying?

Ans. The woman starts crying when she sees her own reflection in the mirror and realises that she has lost her charm, beauty and youth. She has grown old.

(h) What do you think the 'terrible fish' in the last line symbolizes? What is the poetic device used here?

Ans. The ‘terrible fish’ symbolises the bitter truth which puts human beings to a fatal end. The poetic device used here is a simile.

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5. Read the poem silently and answer the following questions:

(a) List out the adjectives that have been used to describe the mirror. Add a few more adjectives to the list.

Ans. Adjectives used in the poem to describe the mirror:
silver, exact, honest, faithful, unmisted, unbiased, four cornered

A few more adjectives for the same are listed below:
Deep, significant, reality, bitter, fair, honest

(b) In the second stanza why has the narrator replaced the mirror with a lake? What is he/she trying to focus on?

Ans  In the second stanza, the poetess has replaced the mirror with a lake to add a new dimension to it which is depth. The lake has depth. Both the mirror and the lake have the quality of reflecting the image of what appears before them. Just as anything falls and drowns into the lake, the youth and beauty of the woman seems to have drowned  in the mirror.