Someone has to leave.
There is no different end to this story.
This is my legacy to bear.

Your attention is hollow, fleeting, and doomed
But direct your gaze at me anyways
For I am so gracious, so funny, and true
With a penchant for impermanence and a need to entertain
Let me reinvent myself everyday for you
I can sing and I’ll do a dance or two

I feel sick as the words come out and come out and come out and back again
fluorescent and out of tune
But never mind, give me time
I’ll watch the contours of your face and carve my tongue to match your every trait
Hey!
Hey! stay with me
Don’t look away, the glamor will fade
I am only an ingenue for as long as you gaze at me, and
I’m not ready to let go of my youth, my naivety

When the show is over, will you stay?

When my voice runs course and my hands are pained
Will you deprive me of this masquerade?
My set is done, the jokes have been delivered
The curtains must close on this charade

My eyes search for you in the crowd, but I stare into the spotlight instead
for hope is not helpful for a ingenue
By the time the applause is gone,
I know you have collected your things,
Tipped a dollar,
and been on your way

and I will return to my station:
A perverse demonstration, an outdated sensation
held constant in time, as I watch
failed punchlines turn into a sign of the times
You loved these before, I realize
But I think you learned my every limerick and rhyme
I played my hand too soon
My fan-favorite absurdity has become annoying to you.

An agreeable archetype held hostage by audience appetite
A likable, but not loveable pageant piece

I lick a pitiful, performative purpose off the knives of an absent destiny

What is love if not a loss of dignity?

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Antara Varma is a freshman at Brown College, majoring in English. As a writer and artist, she is especially interested in examining creative production in eras of cultural upheaval, specializing in Post-Colonial literature and 20th-century art movements. In her free time, she writes and publishes poetry on her Instagram and website (@blueinkpot20 and www.blueinkpot.com), dances, and (obsessively) rewatches 2000s Bollywood movies.