The Stage Manager

Aunt Manya always quoted
Diaghilev to Nijinsky: “Astonish me.”
And so it was in the stagings
of the ballet, with music
of Debussy, Satie, Ravel, and Stravinsky.

Their music shattered
a little boy in short pants
watching Sleeping Beauty
or The Red Shoes
from the second balcony.

All these characters were linked
by voices, costumes and feet
and by systems of Russian engineering
that my uncle had put in place
all in the span of time
until he turned to the cosmos
to reach more summits of exploration
now on a planetary dimension
for new astral spectators
under colossal direction.