A Pantomime Letter

To: The Front half of the Pantomime Horse

Re: Stage timing

Why should you have all the glory?

Why should you have all the fun?

I want a chance to tell my story

I want my moment in the sun

It's dark in here.  I'm feeling poorly.

Please tell me - are we done?

Yours in attachment

The Back Half

Faith

The world was bare that day.  I stood alone on the mountain top.  There was nothing but rock beneath my feet.  From above there came a whisper;

"Listen."

I looked up and the world will never be the same.

Laughter flowed from a speck of a lark.  Sunbeams doubled over in silent laughter.  The joyous howl of the gulls spun out the weave of the sky.  The world was furnished with ripples of mirth.

How can this world be bare?

The world was still that day.  I walked alone on the moor. All was the same whichever way I stared.  From behind came a whisper;

"Look."

I turned and the world will never be the same.

The grass blades bowed for the start of a promenade.  A hare leapt high in a whippoorwill prance. The heather bounded with secret dances.  The world was alive in a constant dance

How can such a world be still?

The world was silent that day.  I sat alone on the cliff-top. Only the sea broke the horizon. From below there came a murmur;

"Feel."

I bent and the world will never be the same.

The soil beneath my fingers shifted; singing.  The waves sang of life and of freedom.  The sands wove a burring song of being.  The world swirled with song.

How then is this world silent?

The world mourned that day.  I knelt alone in the garden.  My heart was black with bleakness.  From the distance came a call;

"Come."

I followed and I will never be the same.

I found a man standing tall beneath a tree.  His eyes held the laughter of the sky.  He walked towards me and his gait was the dancing of the moorland.  he smiled and his smile was the song of the cliffs.  The flowers unfurled in victorious life.

How can I be alone when the laughter and the song and the dance and the life of the whole wide world walks with me?

Through a world which is furnished with laughter.

Through a world which is alive and dancing.

Through a world which swirls with song

Through a world which can never die.

Judgement time?

If you judge before you know

you will say:

She is the cat who walks alone.

She is arrogance and pride.

She does not want us at her side.

If you wait to know before you judge

you might say:

She has wounds that will not heal.

She is pain and fear and grief.

She walks apart, to our relief.

Which is false and which is true?

That, my friends, I leave to you.

Remember

Remembrance Day. 9:45. Our brigade - glorified, vilified, mostly forgotten - leading the way in the main parade.

"By the left, slowmarch!"

The Union Jack hanging at half-mast on the flagpole sways, reaching out as we pass.

"Eyes right!"

"Salute!"

Crimson poppies blaze below craning necks and smaller, handheld Union Jacks flutter frantically to match the one hanging half-mast. Mottled coats flourish beneath wind-reddened faces.

The crowd's whisper swells over us. "Are they coming? Do you see them? Who's riding in the carriage?" They looks past our brigade, pointing, "Is that the band coming?"

A shrieking fife leads the way and wailing horns wrap us in sound.  Muffled bells ring from the cathedral tower, drowned like some of those we remember.

They shall grow not old, as we who remain grow old

Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn

At the going down of the sun and in the morning

We will remember them

Bright uniforms glint in the November sun.  Scarlet tunics. Black trousers.  Tartan kilts.  Green berets.  Khaki battle-dress.  They are all in the parade.

But our grey uniforms lead.

This is our day.

The cathedral doors stand outstretched in welcome.  Soft gloom and bright light stripe the road beneath our leaders' feet.

"Files right and left divide!"

Thomas Atkins and Jonathan Brown step over the threshold and turn opposite ways.  The rest of us follow, peeling apart in formation to line the walls.  A younger, brighter company follows us in and carries its standard up the nave.  Then another.

The famous faces step down from their carriage and come in.  Conversation buzzes to a halt.  The congregation stands.

Against the wall, unnoticed, we come to attention.

A company of veterans brings up the rear.  Their polished medals swing on fading ribbons.

At the last, these are people we know and admire. They, like us, have stepped on battlefields and scurried through bullet fire.  A few even remember us.  Even fewer notice us.

And unlike them, our uniforms are bare.  Our only medals are memories.  Our only ribbons are scars that will never fade.  The only standard we bear is our name.  For each of us, only our name.

But every year, we come here to be outshone.

Every year, unnoticed, unasked, we lead the parade.

For this is our day.

We shall grow not old, as those who survived grow old

Age shall not weary us, nor the years condemn

At the going down of the sun and in the morning

We will remember them

As we wait, lining the cathedral walls, a boy tugs at his father's sleeve and points.  He points at us.  We catch his eye and lift weapons in salute.  His eyes turn to stars, though his father never turns.

On Remembrance Day, one person at least remembers us, notices us.

The forgotten heroes of too many forgotten wars.

We come every year to remember and be remembered.  Lining the cold stone walls in our ghostly grey.  Rank on rank of thinning faces that carry the last vivid memories of ancient wars.

Poppies used to adorn the fields where we fought, crowding out the grass like the blood we spilt there.

Now the poppies that crowd us from the battlefields are paper and plastic.  A collecting tin replaces the rattling drum.  And tomorrow the poppies will vanish, chasing our memory from the world like all your other unpleasant thoughts.  Dusty and forgotten, we will fade.  Until next year comes round.

Who remembers the unsung dead?  Who remembers those left behind in long gone years?

We remember ourselves.

We know the Unknown Soldiers.  We march with the nameless victims.  We form the nameless hordes of cannon fodder.  But each man carries his name in his heart.

We carry our standard high on our day.  In our hour.

Remembrance Day.  11:00

Our brigade - glorified, vilified, mostly forgotten - shouldering guns as the silence grows.

"By the left, slow fade!"