A Strange Refraction

A stranger looks into a mirror, 

Expecting to see himself,

But is surprised to find that he isn't. 

Where he should be is a gaping hole. 

Curious, he goes to people and tries to show them,

But they all look at him with a cocked brow,

And puckered lips.

"Are you stupid?" 

They would ask in disdain.

"I see you fine!"

Distraught, he spends his days in front of the odd mirror,

Wasting away trying to find himself in the glass. 

Wailing and pounding at the glass.

One day a little girl with a frilly white dress came to him.

"My mommy told me you were stupid." 

She said kidishly.

The man looked at her with sad eyes. 

"She is right." 

The girl said nothing at first,

Then bent down and stuck a marker in his hand,

And ran home. 

For days the man was fixated on the marker and the mirror,

Once again thrown into the void.

They say they found his body on the ground in front of the same mirror he spent years at,

With a new addition to it;

A man with sad eyes and wide arms,

Drawn in a black marker.