<aside>
There it is. The first mirror.
Onward.
</aside>
<aside>
// He fancies himself a bit of a philosopher king, which isn't far from true really. He is composing this mostly-serious poem as a way of collecting his thoughts, understanding what he is thinking deep down, and commemorating the occasion.
As a boy, I peered ahead into the dazzle of my own becoming,
squinting to see what lay in wait down one pathway or another.
Today I turn back and see my choices by their shadows, stretched in the long light of the past;
the post-noon sun calls me forward, drawing me with warm and lustrous rays.
// A pause before this last "few hours" part. He's adding this as a coda with a more-flippant attitude, as one might do in Zen. It's a formalized way of not taking one's self too seriously; he has composed many poems with such codas.
We've a few hours before evening yet, or isn't that so!
小时候，我总是凝望前方， 渴望看到属于自己的光芒，
眯着眼看着前路， 想知道不同道路尽头有什么在等我。
如今我回过头， 在往昔的光照下看清那些决定， 只剩下拉长的影子；
午后的阳光呼唤我向前， 用温暖而璀璨的光芒牵引着我。
离傍晚还有几个小时， 不是吗！
</aside>
<aside>
Not bad so far. I'd been so worried. It was all so formidable in memory.
Decades of buildup.
// He's referring to the first time he visited the Mirror Isles to do the trial, when very young. I was but a child, yet.
</aside>