Oscar
The feature is finis.
The dim lights come up.
The audience sloughs to the exits.
My movie,
always ending,
skin and hair,
all those cells that leaving
make us new every seven years,
becomes part of an endless population
of scurrying crowd,
swept up candy wrappers,
exiting couples, of
seats being refilled.
The sequels while technically
more sound, seem to die quicker.
There is a smell of stale popcorn.
The crowd led now by orange floor lights
seems tentative, lost,
strangely morose,
as though this new feature,
including the edit
on the cutting room floor,
while part of all great cinema,
will not be winning
this year's awards.
