Why do I exist between presence and absence, in a middle realm without boundaries? If I concentrated in the right way, my reflection temporarily returned. It was where I appeared visible to myself by being invisible. That antique mirror became my holy site, an intersection between inner and outer worlds.
The pavement before that shop window was my favorite place to stand in the city’s vague hours and reflect on why I don’t reflect. It once reflected a Bowery saloon of the 1890s. In the display window of an antique shop on West 25 th Street near 6 th Avenue in Manhattan, there’s a horizontal, oval mirror in a gilt frame carved with wildwood nymphs and fauns. I’ve often stood in front of reflecting surfaces and not seen myself and deeply wondered: Why? The undead exist without shadow or reflection.
