The Mirror of Love.

The Mirror of Love

Alan Moore and Jose Villarrubia

Top Shelf

ISBN: 1891830457 $24.95 116 pages

It is one of the most beautiful love poems I've ever read. A beautifully wrought, emotional and devastating, it tells the story of homosexual love, but anyone who has ever loved, or wanted love, or even dreamt of it despite themselves, will find tears in their eyes over these perfectly wrought words and thought provoking, elegant pictures.

Starting from the very beginning and ending with thoughts about the future, it is a love letter and a history, as the narrator addresses his or her words right to their beloved.

"And I marched as I loved, my dear, with thee, always with thee."

The narrator mentions famous names and events, events of horror as well as hope. The people mentioned are all listed in back, Alan Moore has included a wonderful set of appendixes that definitely enhance the experience. The short historical snippets allow you to understand exactly the person he mentions place in history (Mata Hari, Michelangelo and The Ladies of Llangollen are just a few of those mentioned). The next appendix has the full text's of the poems he quotes from, one line snippets that meld seamlessly into Moore's own work. Here we have poems from Sappho, Michelangelo, Emily Dickinson and Wilfred Owen. The third appendix shows a very interesting list of suggested reading, and the fourth discusses Clause 28, an English law that attempted to deny the existence of homosexuality, and where the roots of this poem has it's place, as the work first appeared in a comic (AARGH!) created in protest of this law.

Jose Villarrubia's photos, one next to each page of poem, are extraordinary and evocative. The first page, nothing but the beautiful, quiet blue of the sea, the next, a dark image of a painted face we can almost see symbolizes the emergence of man, the next, a close up of a lower part of a face, the lips stained with blood. The picture becomes even more disturbing when you read:

"The word was law: in Sumer, women scorning men had teeth crushed with burned bricks."

You can feel your teeth hurt. The pain of that becomes real. And then, a few pages later,

"Spat blood through powdered teeth, staining each other as we kissed.

Always we loved."

Reminds us of that pain of a few pages ago, but turns pain to a triumph of sorts, even through the pain of broken teeth, even though the blood and fear of worse happening, they still loved.

The models Villarrubia uses are powerful, ethereal, perfect. The Spartan, helmed, blood covered, is no less perfect that the rose crowned women who lay side by side, each with an arm around the other's head, their faces the definition of peace and content. The pictures and words alone could each tell their own story, but together, they are magic and pain and hope.

In a perfect word, if one were searching for a quote on love, Alan Moore would be listed in Bartlett's. I dare anyone to read this book and not be moved.