“Screw this, I quit!” I toss my script into the fireplace; 

burn all the words you wrote out for me.

“Goodbye forever,” I call, firmly putting on my hat

and swinging right out of those revolving doors to the

theater I never should've worked for in the first place.

Call me a free agent —

mostly because my agent left me this morning

after she heard about the kind of publicity I've gathered:

None! None at all, nothing but radio silence. Music to my ears. 

Apparently, no publicity is bad publicity,

and bad publicity is still publicity, and publicity breeds controversy, 

so, I’m going to live my life as a hermit in the mountains

far away from civilization.

The Director has never suffered such a heartbreak.

“Oh-no, how could this have happened?” 

She laughed at my improv, crossed off my lines, 

marked all my blockings, criticized my every step.

I didn’t know it was a musical until she forced me to dance.

Now her star refuses to return no matter how many tears she sheds. 

What a tragedy, she may never recover from the crushing loss — 

or so I thought until I saw her yesterday coaching a brand-new lead. 

As long as someone wants their fifteen minutes, 

the lights stay on in the theater.

The Director told the rest of the cast I had a fit of narcissism, 

sabotaging the show on purpose, 

but she was the one who loosened the boards on the stage. 

When the light overhead fell, 

attempted murder taking place, 

I realized that there is no place for me here 

on a graceless, thankless stage 

with thousands of strangers cheering me on 

without knowing the drama behind the scenes, 

much more than any pretend drama acted out on stage.

So, I hop on the subway and hope for tomorrow 

and hope the sirens downtown aren’t coming for you.

Tomorrow I’ll turn the TV on in my little cottage a million miles away 

to find the shocking news that a theater in the city burnt down, 

nothing left but a block of black and miserable ash.

Some will say it was a senseless accident, someone’s candle left on, 

and others will surely suspect foul play, 

but I think no one else is to blame except 

the directors who write out the words and try to fan out 

their own fires 

til the whole place catches flame.

Goodbye forever,

Cordially yours,

Forget me like I’ll forget you, 

an unpaid unaspiring overworked actor