By Jack Joseph Smith
Original Scan
AI Interpretation
A handwritten night poem moves from sight beyond seeing through cleansing and urgency to a mirror image that still leaves the speaker insisting, "But I am me."
The poem treats perception as something more than ordinary vision: night, mist, and mirror all blur the self, but the closing line reasserts identity. The omitted struck line would have made consolation too easy; the active text keeps the pressure on action and self-recognition.
A short handwritten lyric links night, veils of mist, struggle, and a mirror before ending with the speaker asserting selfhood.
The page is inward and ceremonial. Its repeated sight imagery pushes toward revelation, but the result is plain and stubborn: after fighting, fleeing, and cleansing, the speaker remains themselves.