Shadows of a Playhouse
In the backstage catacombs
Where children used to play,
I now see only shadows
Left from yesterday.
Where once a ragged urchin sat,
There’s just a plain old wall.
And where a someday author wrote,
There’s nothing there at all.
Where sparkles used to linger,
Now there’s naught but dirt.
I think of happy, gone-on days
And my heart begins to hurt.
Where we smiled and practiced lines
There’s shadows, nothing more--
Shadows of students and children,
Shadows of props on the floor.
We thought we were inseparable,
But good things rarely last.
Once life was a fairy tale,
But our glory days are past.
--R. E. Mayes
Feb. 2009

This poem is about my experience as Want, the street urchin in A Christmas Carol at Maranatha. After you've taken your final bow, the cast still remembers each other, still might keep in touch, but when you go back and see how much has changed, it can really be depressing.