If I Must Play a Part in Your Show

If I must play a part in your show
I will sing and dance upon your stage
and hide my soul’s secret sorrow behind my smile.
I will visit your shops full of shiny treasures
and walk along your streets with beautiful people,
but please forgive me
if nothing there catches my eye
and no one captures my heart
for I can’t bear to breathe the air
of a world without you in it.

This is all I ask of you –

If I must play a part in your show
let me be the infant you send into the arms of strangers
who cries all day and night for a reason no one understands
and searches every face, looking for your smile.

If I must play a part in your show
let me be the little child who throws the toys across the room
then crawls his lonely confines searching every corner
for something missing from his world.

If I must play a part in your show
let me be the troubled youth, who feels alone with friends,
whose would-be lovers wonder why they can never be enough
to win a heart that hides the wound that never heals.

If I must play a part in your show
in my prime let me still stare off, seeing nothing of the world.
Let me live my life obsessed with longing and leaving
from the moment I fall into your drama of desires.

If I must play a part in your show
let me be the beggar, ever standing at your door
grateful to grow old, holding out my begging bowl
with trembling hands and eyes streaming tears
begging you to grace me with a morsel of your mercy,
the only food on which souls survive
exile’s endless rainy night
of separation from your smile
and isolation from your light

If I must play a part in your show
let me leave this world still listening for your voice
echoing through lonely corridors of space and time,
calling me on the welcoming winds of home.

O let my final days trail off –
as I trek the secret skies in search of you.
Let me die of longing to see you again
standing there at last in the starry lane.