Acting
Oblivion
By Lorelei Bade
Elizabeth Mason
One, The curtain opens It begins Rush onto the stage, spewing lines that have been rehearsed over and over and over and over But you stumble along, years of practice for scenes you just can’t get right because you know they aren’t yours, Scratched out and written over and analyzed ‘til the point of “perfection,” but what is that? Feeling as though you were just cast to play someone who you’re supposed to be instead of who you are Two Wardrobe change New day, different mask, who are you now Hurry up and take the stage, don’t trip and don’t slip because God forbid they see you through the cracks in the mask, closer the real you than anyone has ever been Those two seconds Before the rush and then You return, center stage, a character as bright as the lights above but inside, it’s close to an abyss Dark, unending, and you’ve already tripped and how you just. Keep slipping. Three It’s close to over now, you’re almost out of breath, using your last seconds to keep up this dacade Because you want this to be who they remember, the perfect, the effortless As if you’re playing the role of angel and if you keep trying that’s who you’ll become And then you see it The lights start to dim and the clapping dies as the silence consumes all the air in your lungs Curtains close The end
I’ve spent my life perched on a cliff Content with staring out into oblivion And watching time tick by on a whim, Satisfied with existing alone. So indulged was I, the solitary observer, In watching the void swallow up Soul after soul after willing soul, That it came to my utter and terrified surprise When I felt your hands press against y back And suddenly I was fallingDown, Down, DownParalyzed by the shock of your palms Rather than the rush of the freezing winds As I rapidly drew nearer to the ground. I was too concerned with the foreign sensation of gravity After floating so high above the rest of the world To realize you had jumped down behind me For the sake of letting your body fall victim to physics. I was too preoccupied with becoming a part of the world I had been so long content to merely observe To notice how you’d drawn up your body beside mine For the sake of hitting the ground at the same time I did. No regard for my previous satisfactionNo remorse for casting y body into oblivionNo care for how little I shared in your sentiments, Which centered mainly around your personal thrills. You knew how to fallIt was natural for you- But I had never left my perch at the top of the world. And so my instincts told me, “Be afraid.” And it was only in the moment before I hit the ground That I discovered the reasoning behind your jump 21
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