The Puppeteer

The puppeteer leaves, 

smoking jacket in laying upon the eaves. 

Tools of striking, of scraping, 

they are no more. 

The mantles hold but not one, 

but two, three, five, twenty.

The puppets stand, 

the strings which time must hold them in, 

the cages their porcelain faces must stay. 

Moonlight lights iris' held in time, 

seeing one of many shows, 

many frights to have known. 

And they live for yet another show.