Begin – A Creative Response to A Little Night Music

In honor of the poetry in At the Old Place, and our recent 25th Anniversary Season, >for sale we’re going to share a few poems submitted by audience members in response to A Little Night Music. 

Begin
By Alice Gallagher 

New again
What to say?
Remember to smile
Memorize the rhythms
Be your best
Long halls, long hours, till I’m home and safe
Soon

I am known
How strange
Admiring glances disguised as something else
He is masterful here
I am safe
I will reveal myself, my shame
Soon

You are brown and tweedy—bearded
Your eyes –sad
Your body sags
Your brain –powerful, alluring
Bottomless
Navigating surely—easily
You invite me—now

I am small—uncertain, wooden
What draws you in?
The paint? The sails that let me soar and sweep?
Your bulk impenetrable, unmovable
You exist in a world of duty.
Free from anchors,
I submit to my whims—now.

And soon you go back to the work and money
And I call to you, “Now!”
But there are calls –meetings
Country clubs and weekends away
Graduations, weddings
Home
Relatives
And you say, soon

Wee offerings and hope
Against tempests and turmoil
Isolation and lonesomness
And I say, “Now”
Again you leave
Parties and meetings
Renovations and trips
Illness and anxieties
And you say soon

And I cry as my heart is laid bare
And I steel myself against the pain
And I tell myself no more
It’s over Now
And you say stay with me
And you reach out for my hand
You cling and you haggle
You promise—Soon

So many years and I start to enjoy this game
You lost in a world that offers me nothing
And all along there is stillness and starlight in solitude
I drift away
And you say, “Now!”
And I say, later my love
Later

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