Jean-Louis Barrault As I Lay Dying

Heavy storm was sweeping dark Paris streets Lit with dim lights that dreary November night With ghostly shadows lurking in the corners Cold wind dancing with dirty wet leaves fallen In the water pools in the middle of the street It has been raining already for three weeks Everybody was getting impatient and Anxiously praying for a long waited relief Behind the closed doors of Theater de I’Atelier Filled with mythical spirits of Champs-Elysees That gloomy night a magic was about to happen The stage was sunken in the darkness yet While audience quietly was taking seats An imaginary world was opening behind The heavy black curtain that was hiding The secrets of magic of the theater And was slowly rising to the ceiling The center stage circle was bright lit With dark corners filled with imaginary Shady creatures crawling slowly towards The center like moths attracted to the light It felt like a fiesta of the creatures of the night Unexpectedly stunning confused audience White horse emerged from the darkness Like a fool moon sliding over the edge Of a heavy cloud in the center of the stage Stopping for a moment glancing shyly Then jumping over the edge of precipice The horse hit the ground with his hoof Terrifying sound left his wet snout He leaped and flew towards horizon That was emerging on the backstage With dark heavy curtains rising And opening the view in front of Audience suspended in disbelief Of endless prairie going forever Touching the edge of the sky And extending itself like a lazy Snake towards the milky way Stunned audience gasped A quiet moment passed by And then a young man appeared In the middle of a vast lit stage Sitting on a horse and smiling In a victorious way like someone Who just tamed a wild mustang Just like he was trying to tame his pain For all those long unbearable days While his mother was lying in bed At a small window to the backyard And watching a coffin to be made For her from a raw three trunk That smelled like wind and the sun She knew she was slowly dying And quietly waited till preparations Are made so the moment of death Can come over like a welcome guest And take away her lonely aching soul Which used to be like a white mustang That was dreaming of being free and wild Running green fields and chasing clouds But was tamed by the hardships of life And was reduced to a battered drought By everyday heavy exhausting load She was getting weaker every day Every night that was passing by Took her strength bit by bit But her spirit was not dead yet She made an extreme effort To stand and walked slowly outside To see the moon and the sky Filled with stars and a big dipper Friendly smiled into her eyes Her white long hair was flying In harsh cold wind that night Like a spider cobwebs spread wide Touched the nose of a white horse He made a quiet sniffing sound When she leaned on him and died She was holding horse with her arms Her empty eyes were staring at the sky Young man sitting on the horses’ back Grabbed her swiftly and pulled up Like a light body of a sleeping child On a bare wooden floor of the plain stage Hypnotized enchanted audience saw A young man holding an old woman In his arms on the back of a white horse Who was crossing the universe towards Shining bright twinkling star North He was flying far away from the sorrow To the light that lifts the hollowness Of the arduous earthly life It was a single mime on a plain stage But his movements gestures and face Created artistic full blooded alive Image of Love Hope and Escape Audience saw a trinity on the stage In a few different kaleidoscopic Dynamic emerging and fleeting ways Brought to life by a willpower of a man Who squarely believed in the magic of stage A year ago he was in a creative daze In the middle of night on the stage Taming a wild horse till exhausted He fell down on a bare cold floor Slipping in a deep like death sleep He was walking in a prairie filled with Tall wild grass reaching the clouds He got lost and his heart was beating loud Then he saw an old woman who was lying On a dry grass floor at the water pool With long white hair spread wide With empty eyes staring at the sky She looked at him and died A young man her beloved son was Feverishly trying to hold indomitable Horse with his young strong hands So he can take his pain away And he would not have to feel The loss and to think about The dialectics of death and life He saw a horse a man and a woman In his vision that night very late Almost in the morning when sunrise Was coming through the window And the horse was hopping away In to the opening gap of the Bleeding red morning sky Melting into distant disappearing Constellation of milky way When he opened his eyes He was deeply shaken by the image He saw in his dream last night Which expressed the essence Of sorrow despair pain and loss The image of a man woman and a horse So he knew he had to try To tell the story on the stage The way he saw it in his daze The audience was very quiet When the stage curtain fell down Announcing the end of the show On the bare stage on the plain floor Magical world that opened the doors Into delicate realm of shapes and forms Had a strange effect just like a raging storm That was gone by the time of the end Bringing unexpected agonizing relief That Aristotle called the effect of catharsis Or the purge of a suffering wounded soul That couldn't find peace in the real world