The Work of Living Rooms

The living room
is not exactly an ironic place

to be, looking back at me
from strategically hung

mirrors holding
not what lives here,

but what passes
for living. The top

of a head, a corner
admiring itself, jade

receiving dawn next
to aloe, philodendron,

just like my mother's
mantel before me held

trailing vines and my father's
closet door mirrored

lives passing loud
and humble.