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I.
You wanted answers, I gave you answers. You didn't like the answers, so you cursed me. Because you cursed me, I turned my back on you and blocked out the sun. In darkness, you banded together with your rebels and lit fires in the dark. You raised your sword against me. Still I did not turn to face you. You stabbed me in the back and I bled into the sea. I wept, causing The Great Deluge that drowned you. In death, you approached me, however timidly. You bowed down at my feet and wept. I forgave you. You asked for nothing more.

II.
The sun was weary, and the sky was cold. I asked God one question. I can't remember what it was. But He answered me. He said, "You have fire and water, a body and a soul. All your questions will be answered in time. Worship the sky if you must, or worship the earth. But know this, I have created greater things than these, that you have not seen. Does that make you afraid? It should. Good. Now take this kiss that I offer you. In it lies the secret to love. Should you forget, look at sun, look at the moon, look at the stars, look at the earth. It will remind you, and you shall pass like a wind into wonderment.

III.
Bathe your breath upon these words. Your tongue is wet, and so are your eyes. You have longed for this moment since you welcomed the shadow into your house. Fire wants to know everything all at once, and thus, it destroys everything. Everything but water. Bathe in the water of these words. Answer the call to oblivion before it takes you for good.

On the Road

My feet study closely the apocryphal scriptures

of the road. The stars above me sing the Te Deum.

I wonder why. I myself am singing an old song

from deep in my memory. I know why. 

There is faith in the song, for it carries me. 

Faith I create, with words and melody.

I have faith in the moon, the buxom 

proprietress of the sky. 

Ambassador of my soul, my song

is old and wizened, and brings with it

a message of peace. Won’t you welcome him?

Even now there is a feast being prepared

in his honor. He is starving, and will gladly eat.

Give him wine, let him drunkenly speak.

The road is long, and its scripture enigmatical,

but the truths it espouses are good fodder

for my song. The stars keep singing,

as if to welcome me to heaven.

But I am not ready to go there yet.

Give me the long, strange, burdensome road

that I might keep singing, and my old diplomatic song 

may offer the world a perfect, if momentary, peace.

Fleeing Sanity

Setting: A bourgeois living room. There is a sofa and two chairs.

At Rise: CYNTHIA, a pretty woman in her mid-fifties, reclines on the sofa, reading a book. Seated in one of the chairs is HENRY, also in his mid-fifties, a brawny, stiff man wearing glasses. He is tapping his fingers on the arm rest nervously.

HENRY

I can’t believe he’s not up yet. He’s been sleeping for almost twenty hours.

CYNTHIA

Give him time. He’s had a long couple of days.

(Pause. Henry continues to tap the chair. He looks at his watch.)

HENRY

(Suddenly): I’m going up there. (He begins to rise.)

CYNTHIA

Honey, please…

(Enter JEFFERY, 22, a good looking young man with wild curly hair, dressed nicely.)

CYNTHIA

You’re up.

JEFFERY

Yes, I am up. But I did not sleep.

HENRY

What do you mean you didn’t sleep? What have you been doing all this time?

JEFFERY

I have been…(He smiles wryly) awakening.

(Henry and Cynthia look at each other, baffled.)

CYNTHIA

Awakening? Honey, are you OK?

JEFFERY

I have surpassed description. I am silence, and yet I am noise.

HENRY

What are you talking about? Are you on drugs?

JEFFERY

My only drug is silence.

(Henry peers into Jeffery’s eyes, as if inspecting him. He turns to Cynthia.)

CYNTHIA

Jeffery, what is this about?

JEFFERY

It is about the noise, and the silence. The rain and the trees, the mellifluous flow of the breeze. The ancient tides as they swing on their pendulum of moonshine. Give me death. Yes, give me death. Or better yet, give me eternity.

HENRY

(Turns to Cynthia.) Cynthia, call an ambulance.

(Jeffery begins to laugh hysterically.)

CYNTHIA

Yes, I think I will.

JEFFERY

(Suddenly) Demons! I’ll see you in Hell!

Jeffery bolts for the door and runs out before Henry can catch him. Cynthia dials the phone.

CYNTHIA

Yes, police? We’re having a problem.

Setting:The woods. It is the middle of spring, late dusk. 

At Rise:The woods are shadowy and the ground is covered in brush and dead leaves. There is a large ROCK in center of stage, and a group of DAFFODILS are growing.

(Enter Jeffery from stage right. He is running, breathing heavily, and barely able to keep himself up. He trips over ROCK in middle of stage, falls flat on his face, comes up covered in leaves. He is out of breath as he wipes the leaves from his shirt and pants.)

JEFFERY

A good seven miles. I’ve given myself room to rest.

(He sits down.)

JEFFERY

It will be dark soon. No water, no food. Ah, but there’s the sun. 

(He looks at the sun, which is a spotlight above the audience, and smiles.)

JEFFERY 

No one steals the soul of the sun. It’s too great to steal. Like my soul.

(Pause)

JEFFERY

(Bitterly): Let them try. They’ll turn to dust. (Ponderously): Ah, yes. Dust. We all turn to dust eventually. For getting too close to the sun. But the soul…The soul is everlasting. Soon the sun will set, and my soul will merge with shadow. What parting words have you for me, oh sun? Run. Yes, run. But for now, we rest.

(He notices a DAFFODIL growing beside him, picks it.)

JEFFERY

Daffodil. Otherwise known as narcissus. Amaryllidaceae. From the Greek meaning “to sparkle.”And oh, how you sparkle! To think, little one, thou wert once a man who gazed upon his own reflection and fell in love. Now you have no eyes to see with, yet you project both the love of the gazer, and the reflection, combined. How glorious thou art, little demigod! How glorious!

(He becomes emotional)

JEFFERY

(Addressing daffodil): I have taken thy life for a whim! My love for you has destroyed you! Yet, your ephemeral company shall be a blessing. What’s that you say? To die in my hand is worth a thousand springs? I will keep you, then, till you shrivel and die. I’ll keep you here (he puts daffodil in shirt pocket), close to my heart.

(He pats the flower in his pocket, then suddenly looks up)

JEFFERY

The sunset, is it death on the horizon? The sun is slow to set on a day, on a life. The soul of death awakens in the night. But who’s to say if I shall live to see the light? Death’s blade is sharp but day’s rays are bright. There will be death before my mind’s set right. But my soul will never be vanquished. (He takes out the daffodil and begins twirling it in his fingers.)

                                                                        JEFFERY

(In sudden irritation): What need have they of my soul? My gifts are mine to give to those whom I would choose, let it be man or beast or sun or moon. Or myself. Yes, myself. But what is the self? A self is a notion, and nothing more. 

(A voice is heard, soft, like a gentle breeze, stirring through the forest.)

VOICE 

You are not yourself.

JEFFERY 

(Responding immediately and wrathfully): I AM myself! What do you know? I will always be myself! What else could I be? I’ve tried to be a rock, but rocks don’t weep. I’ve tried to be a tree, to stretch myself in a hundred directions toward the sky, to litter the earth with my seeds, but a tree cannot know it will never reach the sky. I’ve tried to be many things and failed. My body is my body. My soul is my soul. And my soul wants out. Yes, it wants to be free.

VOICE 

But where will you go?

JEFFERY

Where will I go? (Sudden realization)I will go to the sea! Yes, and I will bathe myself in the river, and swim down with the current to the sea, to my destiny. Look! The sun is going down. The last teardrop before death.

(A helicopter is heard overhead. Jeffery looks.)

JEFFERY

Demon of the sky! They are searching for me! I must be on my way!

(Jeffery runs off stage left.)

END SCENE.

SCENE 2

SETTING:The same living room.

AT RISE:On the couch, on her hands and knees, her head resting against the arm-rest, weeping uncontrollably, is Cynthia. Standing near her is Henry. His hand is resting on Cynthia’s back..

HENRY

Cynthia, please. Try and be calm.

CYNTHIA

He’s our son, Henry! Our son! How could we…Where is he going? Where will he go?

(Cynthia sobs uncontrollably)

HENRY 

I don’t know. I don’t know.

CYNTHIA 

This whole thing was a mistake. We should have helped him ourselves. We should have…We ought to have…

HENRY 

There was nothing else that we could have done. It was beyond our capacity. 

CYNTHIA 

And what does that say? What does that say about us as parents?

(Henry is silent. He looks down, pained.)

CYNTHIA 

(Sobbing): Our son! Our poor lovely boy! Where are you going?

HENRY 

(His head shaking as he fights back emotion): It’s my fault.

CYNTHIA 

(Looking up and halting her crying): What? What do you mean?

HENRY 

I was too hard on him. I wanted him to be strong, and…principled. But… (he fights back his emotion). I never understood him. I never could embrace him. I tried to suppress that…anger in him, but gave him no outlet for it. He was always such a free-spirited boy. Such a sensitive, sweet boy. But I tried to mold him into something he could never be. (He is holding back tears.)

(Cynthia gets up, puts her arm around Henry.)

CYNTHIA

It’s both of our fault, then. Equally.

HENRY 

But then was this the only way? (He pauses, thinks.) The boy is just so stubborn! Nothing he was saying made any sense! You agree with me, don’t you?

CYNTHIA 

I do.

HENRY

I only hope that he hasn’t…

CYNTHIA 

What?

(Henry begins to speak and the phone rings. Cynthia rushes to pick it up.)

CYNTHIA

Hello?

END SCENE.

SCENE 3

SETTING:The woods. It is now night.

AT RISE: Stage is black, except for a spotlight shining on Jeffery. He is walking slowly, sauntering among the trees. He is singing.

JEFFERY

Lo and behold, the truth unfolds. Darkly we go into the night. Darkly we go, as smoke and ash. Darkly we come, out of the past.

(Jeffery stops suddenly, looks up at the trees. He speaks.)

JEFFERY

Stillness. Strange stillness. Everything has fled, into the shadows. I too flee, as it seems. But why? What for? What is this stillness trying to say?

VOICE

Go home, Jeffery. Go home to your mother.

JEFFERY

(Chuckling) Right. Face the music, so to speak. Live a long life, find meaning in human connection. Spend my days pursuing a goal. A “good” goal, as they might say. But what is it for? It’s for death. It’s all for His reaping. Let me merge with death at full speed, is what I say. I want to embrace death with a ready soul. My soul is ready now. Why waste my days toiling for nothing, tiring my soul, wasting my soul, so that it is no longer ready to meet death? No. I am ready now! If they must weep for me, so be it. They too will soon face death.

(A stiff wind blows)

JEFFERY (Cont’d)

I will go to the place where the wind goes. The perfect stillness. No more shadows…(Pause. Jeffery looks up ponderously) Behold! The stars. Steady in their course, immovable, unflinching. Great gaseous masses whose only instinct is to implode and explode. Their light travels this universe eternally; stretching in their desire only to shine, only to merge with the infinite. And they shall! Oh, how they shall! Lights whose only source is mass itself. And what is time? A trillion years is an instant with the right set of eyes. Yes, see how they shine!

(Three or four flashlights are seen upstage. A voice is heard.)

OFFICER 

I see him!

OFFICER 2 

Where?

OFFICER

Over there! To your right.

(Jeffery hides behind a tree.)

JEFFERY 

(To self): Moon-goddess, make my feet swift. Lead me to the river.

(He runs. One of the officers catches him and tackles him to the ground. He struggles.)

OFFICER 

Be still!

(The Officer puts handcuffs on Jeffery.)

JEFFERY

The trees! The trees are my witness! Moon, be my witness! Stars, be my witness! My soul is held captive! I am a slave! 

(The Officer lifts Jeffery up and begins leading him away.)

JEFFERY

I will have my freedom! Justice exists! (He turns on the officers) Blue-clad demons!  You scorn me! You mock me! You want to know my secret so you can use it against me! But I won’t give you the secret, no matter what torment you inflict on me! The soul will not be bound! Mother! Mother! Mother! Where are you? Why hast thou forsaken me?

VOICE 

You are not yourself.

JEFFERY 

(Looking around): But I am. I am! (He breaks down) I will always be myself! I am myself! Why are you trying to change me?

END OF PLAY.

Wake or Sleep

Thrust as one desperate cry for love

out of the shapeless eons past,

all from a whim this conflagration spread

and will continue to burn till this forest of eternity

is ash. Never will it be ash.

That is what the stars seem to say, at least.

That is the promise that is hidden in the lover’s voice.

You want to know why there are shadows

moving in and out of this poem?

It is because all lovers desire a private space

to make love, and then rest.

Sleep here if you like.

Or wake, if you are sleeping.

Eternally

Await, but secretly, the perfect refuge

of the lover’s embrace. Here, where Time

swallows its judgments and goes about

its business with quiet, ironical repose,

there is no room for space—our bodies

must possess one another and everything else,

every minutia of truth must be discovered

with an infinitude of kisses—here a kiss

from the blue sky, there a kiss up from the earth.

We are children hanging on to the edge of innocence.

We weep tears that become the morning dew.

Our bodies are the instruments through which

our love plays the music of our souls.

Within you, without you, it doesn’t matter.
I know you now, eternally.

Antediluvian Depths

My shadow struck the earth and shattered

into a million butterflies at dawn.

Darkness immersed itself in an ocean of light

and found treasures there

that reflected back the stars.

I have wept such that my tears have risen up

in a cloud of mist that veiled me

shielded me from the eyes

of those whose cups I would fill

and make drunk on the sweet nectar of my song.

The cloud lifts, and, now with

the grace of a once-hidden beauty revealed,

my voice takes over where my tears left off.

Whose tears are these that mix with my own?

This question hangs like the sun—a vision

unattainable by the eyes—over my head,

and my every breath tells a story that began

in the antediluvian depths, where love met hate

and day met night, and made peace with one another
before creating life.

Elegy for Maggie

If years were counted by time spent in love,

Dog years is what you’d get.

For never did she lose her sweetness

Or turn away from a caress,

Never did she look upon me

With anything but sheer innocence.

Time took away her strength to walk

But never her strength to love.

Her heart—oh, bold organ!—that has now stopped

Took with it a thousand great legends,

But the one we have to remember her by

Is her one great life—may it spread like wildfire!

Oh Maggie, sweet dog, your legend

Will be on the tip of my tongue, till the day
That I, too, must die.