A Poem about Mirror Neurons...

ELIZABETH BEAM

ABOUT ME

There are cells in my brain

that respond the same way

to what I do as what I see you do.

When you speak, it’s like my lips are parting,

mouthing the phonemes
in parting from your lips.
When you tell me about yourself,
I live the times you fell from an oak tree,

you swam in the ocean,

you first tasted red wine.

You call up the memory,

and like you, I fall inside it,

swim around in it, taste it.

I feel your arm breaking.

We choke up salty water,

the alcohol dark as blood. We can use this.

Let’s say I lose my arm,

clipped off to a stump at the shoulder—

as I watch you itch yours,

my phantom pain diminishes.

The boundary between us

is not a shade, a crack,

a crossed line—it’s a mirror.

So, you are reading this to

learn something about me?

How about you tell us both

some more about yourself.

 

--Elizabeth Beam