Excerpt from American Dada

This is an excerpt from my new Dada play, "American Dada". The characters Shhh, Hmmm, and Grrr are all aspects of the main characters intellect. Pfft, the main character, is a homeless schizophrenic who may or may not be the Messiah. This scene picks up at the end of a Bacchal Chorus honoring the faces of Divinity over the years. The chorus reinforces the prevalance of Earth and Sky in our worship and quest for answers.

Please read and give constructive criticism. I was looking for impartial reviewers and thought this venue would be suitable. This is part of my editing process, so please give feedback.

Enjoy!




SHHH:

Earth and Sky, Universal constants from Age to Age.  The Earth our Cradle, the Sky above.  Simple and Good, both Source and Source-less.  In our most primitive Thoughts we have always had them, unfaltering constants, alive in many facets.  Each prism-like Face becoming Divine upon inspection.  All hail the Lords of Grass and Leaf!  The tiny gods of Raindrop and Dew.  His Eminence Lord Hillock and the Baron StormCloud.  Every grain of Sand separately Divine and worthy of worship.  Each particle of EarthSky, spun out into an indescribable Potency.  All things are holy and Holy and wholly deserving of Praise.  Not a Bad thought, in the greater Sense of senses.  Yet soon, in a Cosmological Soon-ness, these entirely Holy particles of Godhood become disparate and too far removed from Source.  Beyond our ability to comprehend their quantum nature as Gods.  Thus begins the BackSpinning, the recollection of divine Matter into something more easily digested.  All of this Outside of Time.  EarthSky particulates rush together as a Spiritual torrent of… of… ahhh…

HMMM: 

You were doing so well.

GRRR: 

Truly gripping stuff.

SHHH: 

Silence please.  I am searching for the word.

HMMM: 

Well, search no longer!  It’s simply a matter of Where to Look.

GRRR: 

When to look.  Remember your Catechism?  In the Beginning was the Word.

HMMM: 

I think he Seeks outside of conventional Catechism.

GRRR: 

Then this may take a while…

SHHH: 

Enough.  It is a careful process, please.  I was going to say Truth, but truth in any form is a slippery fellow and cannot Be bounded by our Words.  Instead I shall say Need.  The BackSpinning is a Spiritual Torrent of Need, as you will see, and See.  The EarthSky particulate, once dispersed too far has been recalled by our Need into One Particle.  One crystalline Deity of many aspects.

HMMM: 

Neat.

SHHH

(obviously ignoring Hmmm):  But back within Time, where the majority of us Live, there is a Problem.  The BackSpinning has been successful for many years, in a non-Cosmological sense, to a certain Degree.  This singular Divine particle has grown too Dense, too… limited, and it has caused no small amount of grief.  Conflict has arisen around defining the Nature of this singularity.  Too much conflict, and it has brought into Being untold heaps of distress and hardship.

GRRR: 

Well, yes.  We know.

HMMM: 

It’s not like it only just happened.  Some of us live within Time and have Seen it.

SHHH: 

Have you indeed?  I wonder.  Nonetheless, at this exact point in Time, as it is seen from Within and Without, the particle density of this peculiar point of the Divine has grown so compact and so freakishly UnStable, that a new and revolutionary process is about to Begin.

HMMM: 

When? 

GRRR: 

Truly?  What will it look like?

HMMM: 

Will there be bangs and bright lights?  Drum rolls?  Tickertape?  I love a good tickertape parade!

GRRR: 

Will fire dance and mountains sing?  Plagues of frogs or of perch?  I do so love a good plague!

HMMM: 

Where will it begin to Begin?  Asia?  I’ve always wanted to go to Asia and I do think that Asia is a good place for Beginnings.  It’s all so Big.

GRRR: 

Tell us tell us tell us tell us.  When is the beginning?  We would be there if we could…  should we Look to the Earth?

HMMM: 

The Sky?

SHHH: 

Both.  And neither.

GRRR: 

Typically cryptic.

SHHH: 

Typically?  Indeed.  Look to the Sky then, if look you must. (Both Hmmm and Grrr begin to earnestly search the sky)  It’s held all our hopes, until now.  And Now.  It has been a monumental journey that led us to this Brink.  This edge over edges endless with possibilities.  There is no one Path through the tangled trees of Time.  Just remember that this Beginning, like those Before, is not the ending it will Seem to Be.  The Earth and Sky have deceived you elseWhen and Not all is as it Seems from where you stand.

Shhh begins walking off

GRRR: 

Yes yes yes… but when will it begin?

SHHH

(just before exiting stage, without looking back):  Now.

(As Shhh says “Now”, Pfft’s head comes up as if in sudden realization.  Hmmm and Grrr are standing directly behind him, staring intently at the sky.  Until this moment Pfft has been frozen, staring inward.  Slowly, he comes to his feet, thoughts forming quickly.  The blanket drops from his shoulders.) 

PFFT: 

In the Beginning…

GRRR: 

Shhh!

PFFT: 

In the Beginning was the Word-

HMMM: 

Hey, down in front!

PFFT: 

-and that Word was… Love.  Love is the answer.

(Both Hmmm and Grrr suddenly look at Pfft, them quickly at each other.  With huge simultaneous smiles they rush off back through the pillars.  Pfft is left alone with his revelation.  The light remains focused on Pfft.  Smooth transition to)

scene ii

(The three columns recede and are replaced by the shadowy presence of the arch in Washington Square Park, NYC.  A fountain, a hedgerow and a trash can slide in, seemingly of their own power, from off-stage to dress the scene.  Pfft is standing on his block, surrounded by his books.  Strollers and shoppers begin to pass in the background, talking with each other.  Their numbers should be augmented by black silhouettes passing in the extreme background.  The people ignore the following diatribe unless otherwise noted.) 


PFFT: 

Then what is the Question?  You’ll see.  (pause) Here.  Today.  In this moment.  I have found something worth Knowing.  In here.  In my Head.  My Mind.  My Internal Essence.  Dripping with the sweet fruits of Uh-Huh.  My nasal corridor resonating with the Ageless Om.  All the passages of my head and neck and throat are clogged with rich runny golden Honey.  Lungs awash in Light.  Mouth opening, stretched wide and Wide and wider than the encircling Seas, a note, a Jovian praise hymn or a fully vocal sunrise, rolls forth and bursts like an amber bubble amongst the People: Love.  In the Beginning there was nothing and Nothing and everything was a First.  The first Star, the first candle, the first smile… all lit by Love.  All of the Firsts had Names back then.  Not names, but Names.  Everything in its Beginning had a newness and freshness and was crisp and clean.  One Bird, so named.  One Sun, one Sky, one Fish in the singular Sea.  One cat called Cat and one Day, endless in its pleasures and sensual delights.  It was the same with all of Us.  Think back now, to the Moment tacked onto the front of this life you are Living in the Now.  This Now, not others.  We’ll get to them soon enough.  Remember, or Imagine (its all the same anyway) the First time you Saw a Bluebird or a Tulip or a Sausage or a Mouse or a Motorcycle.  In that moment, that Timeless moment, that Radish or Soupspoon or Corncob was delightfully and elegantly unique.  The first and only You had ever Beheld and it was precious to you as it was Precious to Itself.  Then that moment slips onward, and that wondrous singular Butterfly is joined by another.  And another.  Three identical singular entities.  Each one clearly ‘Butterfly’.  The rational mind, the reasoning mind gives this association to each separately.  To each it assigns, “Thou, thou art Butterfly”.  (pause)  This way lies madness.  I know.  It is a loss of Innocence.  Our First, in life.  Much like Eve and Adam in their idyllic garden full of singularities, we each in our Lives lose Eden when confronted with the duplicity of Nature.  This universe has become heavy with the dripping fat of the multitudes.  Can’t you feel it, hanging off your hips like wretched grubbing grasping children or too much pie?  Contradictions woven over contradictions through deceptions and falseness, our world has become Heavy.  An albatross about the neck of Creation.  We’ve come a long way from Love…