Steven Sanchez – Narcissus

Steven Sanchez

Narcissus

They want you to believe I died

by my own vanity. I knelt

down to drink my reflection 

and cooed to the man watching 

me. I lifted him from the water, 

stroked his hair, tucked it behind his ears,

and held   myself   for the first time. 

I learned how to be tender, how

being a man is an endless grief

for the parts of myself I’ve lost

and was never supposed to love.