by John Grey.
You felt for his female assistant
thin and vulnerable,
naked but for
the sparkle of her sequins.
When Mephisto sawed the woman in half.
you shuddered.
When she slipped into the trunk,
you felt each sword
he jammed right through its sides.
And when, with a snap of his fingers,
the woman vanished into thin air,
you sensed the depths
of her invisibility,
still so manifest
even when he brought her back.