Order for Masks

To this harlequinade

I wear black tights

and fool’s cap

Billiken, make me

three bright masks

For the three tasks

in my life

Three faces to wear

One after the other

For the three men in

my life.

When my Brother comes

Make me one opposite

If he is devil, a

saint

With a staff to his

fork

And for his horns, a

crow.

I hope by contrast

To make nil

Our old resemblance

to each other

And my twin will walk

me out

Without a frown

Pretending I am

another.

When my Father comes

Make me one so like

His child once eating

his white bread in trance

Philomela before she

was raped.

I hope by likeness

To make him believe

this is the same kind

The chaste face he

made

And my blind Lear

will walk me out

Without a word

Fearing to peer

behind.

If my lover comes

Yes, when my Seducer

comes

Make for me the face

That will in colors race

The carnival stars

And change in shape

Under his grasping hands.

Make it bloody

When he needs it white

Make it wicked in the dark

Let him find no old mark

Make it stone to his suave touch.

This magician will walk me out,

Newly loved,

Not knowing why my tantalizing face

Is strangely like the mangled parts of a face

He once wiped out.

Make me three masks.

Order for Masks, Virginia Moreno