out of sequence

damn, it was out of sequence
the blind man upstairs on the balcony
was supposed to laugh first, hysterically,
having confused the potted palm with our heroine...
the jazz players would stop, party goers would look
with questions in their eyes
the exotic lady in her pink wedding dress
would graciously make her entrance
slip down the last three steps
(humor assured in the script)
cuing thus the square dancers to begin
their geometric hullabaloo...
the in-sequence should have been thus

instead, the clown lit the cannon, miming the boom
hands clapping was the cue for lights suddenly going out
and from the bay window the magic skyfall
green pink, yellow and violet streams of fake stars
five minutes of falling multidimensional confetti
(here, the ingenuity of the props assistant
impatiently trigger-happy with the remote control
fifty floors higher)
violent applause, curtain, forty-five minutes early...

from an artistic point of view, nothing proper came from
the out of sequence mess
because the finale arrived in the middle of the second act
two hours of special effects crescendo-ing ruined
the plot truncated incomprehensibly,
in spite of the experimental nature,
although those seeing tonight's first time disaster
(would the critics' write-ups inspire the suppression of the last act?)
might have remembered the myriad of bittersweet rosebuds
of last month's off off Broadway fiasco
floating in a basin of melted chocolate
discreetly clothing the two naked men rising out of it
recounting the brief shadow of silence,
muted and incredulous,
as no one dared be the first to applaud...

alas! the public has become much too puritan
experimentation theatre too often wreaks havoc
in their wayward dreams of propriety
so, in due course, many there also reflected
on the multiplying
out of sequence happenings


out of sequence
12 march, 2006