la traviata.
She sits at a mirror,
a true prima donna
of the opera.
She sits, garbed in the
vestments of Violetta,
feeling too ironic for
herself.
And she sits,
and she cries
with dignity behind
the closed door of
a dressing room
far too luxurious for
her own good.
Five minutes till curtain,
Violetta.
So she hides her woe
from her public
by powdering her face,
absorbing the tears from
her wet, reddened cheeks.
She looks disdainfully
on herself in her mirror,
before departing.
Non lagrima o fiore avrà la mia fossa,
non croce col nome che copra quest'ossa!
I am nameless, as is my despair,
I have loved and lost; I do not care.
And her tears are forgotten on the stage
until her suicide, a dagger of
emotion, pierces into her heart, her cage.