Theater Death
I am in the Theater Death
Alone but not feeling alone
If dead not feeling dead
I go about my business playing out my role
It is not a time for taking chances
Everything is very serious
Scenes started cannot be stopped
Actions must be taken to conclusion
I know that if I begin to speak
My sentence will proceed inexorably
But what is my role
It appears to conform to the character
I remember to have been mine in life
My part consists mainly of inaction
A simple exercise in expectation
I am not Everyman I am Readyman
Although I play in isolation
I do not think I am the only player
I am confident of this
I expect others to step
Onto the stage at any moment
And perform some action in line
With what I do or do not do
I reassure myself about this
Saying I am not the only one
Someone has always come along
Death will not be different
I begin to imagine characters
To complement my performance
An old man sweeping the stage
Silently absorbed in his work
He passes close to me shuffling
Along uneasily the broom whisking
The boards but disturbing nothing
He does not greet me
He does not seem to see me
Yet I could make him notice me
For I have imagined him
But I will not do so deliberately
So as not to step out of character
And jeopardize my authenticity
Alone ignored but expectant
I feel almost like an exile
Whose task is to await a summons
To return perhaps in triumph
But to where seems not to matter
The old man continues sweeping
Except for him the stage is empty
How cleverly I have imagined myself
No doubt others would play this differently
In a bucolic setting or as a celebration
Say a gathering of loved ones
Full of warmth and good feelings
Such scenes are not in my nature
But were they to pass upon the stage
Absorbing other players I would understand
Might even applaud were it permitted
I think of those whose lives were unhappy
Tortured foreshortened exploited afflicted
What roles would suit them
In this Theater Death
Would they repeat their troubled days
Or alter them to suit some need
Replacing the grim with the halcyon
For me that is not an option
The Theater Death is the Theater Life as well
I lack the device to make it otherwise
I need to be what I can understand
Death must be the familiar thing
Were I to put all cant aside
All of this would be impossible
One cannot have a Theater Death
The roles fixed the script written
And nothing left to chance
If doubt waits in the wings
For even as we make our preparations
Moving about as if we are alive
We must know the drama's certain in the end
Thus confident we live on in rehearsal
Of Death as life's reversal
Mirroring the little that we comprehend
Think of God as Pirandello
8/15-10/21/95, 6/27/98
Copyright 1995, 1998 by Maurice Leiter
Posted with permission.
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