As you make your way back-stage
you may occasionally glance out
at the house
and find someone else
in your old seat,
I pretending with them
as I used to with you
that there is no back-stage.
You understand
if I didn’t do this,
it would turn into one of those
experimental theatres.
We’d lose most of our business, at least
the kind we wanted.
But you followed me back here.
I invited you, it’s true
and then like a house guest
looking for something to do
you wandered from mantel piece
to painting to portrait,
and you’re part of the production now.
You know the way
the same steps across the stage
the same entrances and exits
change when performed,
not until the third or fourth time
becoming the way you’ll remember them.
And the way
you wanted to banish
the thoughts of being watched
but instead learned to love
the rhythms we blocked out
and the things you could pronounce
while in costume.
Loved how
in the glare of stage lights
it was like just talking to the dark,
the same dark every actor talks to
that can never be filled.
Although you love me
you acquire an actor’s maturity:
you get used to talking out,
to sharpened motions
that mime what is less simple.