Stage Faust

Faust again attempts

some puny wonder,

but a papier-maché church,

set, cast and city wall,

a plaster castle built on high,

they all upstage you doctor.

Thousands watch bemused

as Marguerite in white,

and Mephisto in red,

twinkle in the spotlight.

Torchlit tumblers juggle,

huge stentorian guards,

Harlequin clowns on stilts,

move in floodlit blue,

a soprano and bass devil

quite obliterate you.

The evil or betrayed and mad,

achieve apocalypse while you play,

quite nebulous in grey,

You fade like lamplight into day,

fail to catch the ear and eye,

beside the glow which others throw

beneath the cantilevered sky.

©Terry Hodgson2020