Upon reflection

A sonnet inspired by my reaction to Tennyson's The Lady of Shallot

Straight from the palette your colours seem to me
You, and your undiluted purity.
Contradictions you wish the others wouldn't see,
You, and your lack of mental unity.
Disillusionment in forms may take you
Beyond these thoughts and the fast things they say.
So dream, dream and pray the melancholy breaks you,
Enough to cut and watch the years seep away.
Glassy eyes look into me; a warning,
Lined in black when they used to be blue,
Lined like a coffin, shallow, in mourning.
Beauty died a death there, the beholder, you.

Its vivid shadows linger like the past
And my dead-pale face in the looking glass.