The strangest thing about Pan,
J.M. Barrie’s Peter Pan,
Is that he instructs Wendy
No one must ever touch me,
After which, Barrie’s stage notes
Instruct, He is never touched
By any one in the play.
The taboo’s never explained.
What would happen to someone
Who touched Peter Pan, that is,
In the frame of Barrie’s game?
Would they die? Would he vanish?
Would the magic world collapse?
Are Peter Pan and Barrie
Just setting the rules they want?
Spirits work well with vision
But touching them’s the third rail
Of illusion, fingering
The magic that isn’t there?
Maybe that’s not the problem.
There’s something you want from art,
Something art can never give.
You must never confirm this.
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