Tim Law is an author of fantasy, horror, detective and general short story fiction as well as the occasional poem or two. He heralds from a little town in Southern Australia called Murray Bridge. A happily married father of three children (plus four cats and a rabbit), family is very important to him. Currently working at the Murray Bridge Library in the role of Library Manager he has dreamed since his early high school years of becoming a full-time author. Working for a library, surrounded by so many wonderful authors it is difficult not to be inspired to write. Tim finds inspiration from playing board games, family movie night, family time and the world around him. The greatest inspiration of all for him comes from asking the golden question “what if?”

Mirror Reflects

Mirror, Mirror, what do you show?
When she stares into you, what does my daughter know?
Does she see the wonder, does her beauty glow?
Or do you only reflect that which makes her feel low?

I am her parent, I demand that you say
The picture you paint for my child each day
Is her world full of sunshine or does she only see grey?
Can we both work together to help her find the way?

I hear her tears as she drifts off to sleep each night
Enters the land of worry and fright
Or is that the world that greets her in the morning light?
A nightmarish realm where words sting and bite

Mirror, Mirror, magical screen
Why are children these days so mean?
Fake smiles, phony friendships, jealous green
Everyone bowing down to the pack queen

Thankfully my daughter is better than that
Lone thinker, straight talker; so alone she sat
Queen Bee smiles broadly, like a Cheshire cat
Sends in a rat to have a quiet chat

Why must individualism be a crime?
My daughter cut down well before her time
While the queen and her rats up the ladder do climb
Rewarded for squashing a flower on the cusp of her prime

Dear Mirror, Mirror, you failed me
Or was it I who did wrong, just couldn’t see
What they were doing to my little girl, daily
What we let them get away with, constantly

How can we help make it cease?
Do we call the police?
Our children face terror when they only want peace
Built-up frustrations, where can they find release?

No, go
Too slow
Confidence low
So the tears flow

Mother begging for an end
Find for daughter that special friend
Happy smiles, all pretend
Both of us going round the bend

Then it’s done
The queen has had her fun
You would think she has finished now the game’s won
And yet in truth, it has just begun

Another girl reflected by you
Sad and angry, she doesn’t know what to do
How to see beyond the words untrue
Queen Bee, queen bully, through and through