La Traviata

Some things, like operas, end simply
by going on, though Maria Callas is dying
frontstage, her lover beside her in tears 
beginning yet another aria, though our lady
of the camellias has died a thousand times over
more than Christ and none
of this—and so much more, I think,
for the ridiculously tacky costumes— 
is believable to any one person
in the audience. Yet, we are here 
to see her die
beautifully
in her lover’s tributary arms,  
for she must give herself
to us. She must give us something
certain in form
of music. And now her lover opens
his deep throat just as my mother
begins to dream
up tomorrow’s laundry list 
and the man sitting to my left
yawns uncontrollably,
and I begin to ask for your hands.
I can almost hear the fiery piano
as your voice calling out to me
from panic and passion. And suddenly
I think the whole room is listening. Maria Callas,
colder now, sings through
the one that survives her. And so what,
so what, I want to burst out
and say to her, so what
if your life is going to end.
It has broken out in rags
of music.