Discovered Clerihew

Reading Paul Fussell's Poetic Meter & Poetic Form (an excellent book for those who wanted to know more than they wanted to know about... poetic meter and poetic form), I read this example of graffito (absurd singular not added, but in the original):

"Soldiers who wish to be a hero
Are practically zero.
But those who wish to be civilians,
Jesus, they run into the millions."

Fussell introduces the poem to point out the value of Trochaic substitution. Jesus, in the fourth line, is a trochee (its first syllable is stressed, as opposed to an iamb in which the last syllable is stressed). This draws our attention (as does the fact that it's a the-tiniest-bit-naughty interjection). (Fussell doesn't mention that soldiers, parallel at the beginning of the first line, is also a trochee; the omission makes me wonder if he doesn't pronounce it as an iamb.)

But what he doesn't mention is that this is a Clerihew. And an excellent one at that. Because there is no prescription for meter, poets in the form cannot fall back on anything and have to find utility in the arbitrary; this anonymous has.

Long John Schill-ver

Wise was aloof Mr. Depp,
when,impressed by Walt Disney's rep,
after years spent ensconced
in the hills of Provence
he did finally get back in lockstep.

Oh What a Night

[ an assignment for my Playwriting class. I was suposed to write the most outrageous and teasing first 2 pages of a play that I could. See if you can get the subtle reference to bloodless revolution buried in there. ]

Walter: (the clerk in a convenience store, on his cell-phone, of ambiguous ethnicity) Yes-- I be home 20 minutes. Fine, fifteen. I do have reason! I stay here Tuesday night two hours preparing for health inspector then have to stay three hours Wednesday getting things back to normal. Fine. I promise-- I be there in 15 minutes. No excuses.

Janet: (woman in her 20's, storming in to the store) No, it's not negotiable.

David: (her boyfriend, behind her, but not as hurried) C'mon, Janet, everything's negotiable. (her look says no). Except our safety and health. I just wish you would listen to my-- (she crosses her arms, but doesn't walk away) We've been in a committed, monogamous relationship for five *and a half* months, we've both been tested twice, I trust you and your history of your former partners and, well, (chuckle) we both know I wasn't getting any before-- (trails off)

Janet: You done? (he nods) OK, then we're just going to pick up some condoms now--

David: It's just, honey, if you loved me--

Janet: Y'know, the more you talk, the more I think we won't be needing any tonight.

David: (eyes bulge when he puts two and two together) Oh, no, we will. (picks them up) See, happy? Just, can we get something else, I don't want the cashier to think--

Janet: To think what? That you have sex? Or that you have sex with me?

David: (realizes defeat) I'm sorry. I was wrong. What kind of flowers do you want?

Janet: (kisses him) That's better. Now let's go get us some chips and dip.

Ms. Tarence: (50-something matron walks to counter with bagel and coffee) 3.12, yes yes. (after plopping down money and taking her change) thanks. (exit)

Judge Cranston: (enters, wanders, 60) (to Walter) Excuse me, sir, where do you stock your tobacco, pipes, and tobacco accessories?

Walter: (perplexed) We have cigarettes. Here. Here. And up here. Nicorette over there.

Cranston: Hmm. But no pipes? (Walter shakes his head) Any cigars? Cigarillos?

Walter: (repeating) We have cigarettes. Here. Here. And up here. Nicorette over there.

Janet: Daddy? Daddy! Okay, weird. Well, Daddy, this is David, my-- my boyfriend.

David: Hello Mr. Cranston. (pause, foot in mouth) Doctor! Hello Doctor Cranston! Is a J.D. a doctorate? I mean, does it entitle-- I've heard so much about you. (trying again) Judge Cranston. Judge Cranston? Justice Cranston-- (settles on one). Your Honor.

Cranston: Yes. You as well. (observes the package) So, off to fornicate with my oldest and only daughter? (David blisters and blushes) No matter, you don't want to tell me, I don't want to hear. (to Janet) he's just as you described him, Janet. For better or worse. Speaking of For Better or Worse, is that a ring you're wearing, Mr. David?

Janet: Daddy, it's a-

David: Actually, Daddy, (realizes his mistake) Sir! I mean, Your Right Reverend--

Janet: It's an engagement band. We're engaged!

Ms. Tarence: (rushing back in, to Walter) I gave you a 20, and you only gave me 6.88 in change! You owed me $16.88! This is ridiculous, can't you people do anything right? I come here every day for 7 years, get the same damn coffee and bagel, and you can't even give me proper--

Walter: You want 16.88? That just glorious! Oh, I gave you the ten dollar bill. (opens cash register, pulls out a bill) See here. One ten left. At start of shift, I have two. Where the other one go? Hmm, let me see, let me see, I bet your fat fingers no able to hold it. Before you accuse me, how 'bout you check in between those massive hams you call breasts. I know no one else look there since 1994. What you use for bra? Hoover Dam?

Ms. Tarence: Oh, you little Jook, you better give me that bill or I'll really give you something to be known as lazy over--

Saul: (entering, with ski mask and revolver) Give me your money, this is a hold up!

Walter: (to Ms. Tarence, thrusting the bill upon her) Is yours, we settled.

Janet: (to Saul) Saul, is that-- Is that you?

Saul: Janet. What-- What are you doing here? I haven't seen you since you-- since we-- You told me you had to move!

Janet: Move on, Saul. I had to move on.

Ms. Tarence: Young man, I can't believe this. That you would stoop so low.

Saul: Listen lady, I'm not going to stand for this. You have no idea--

Ms. Tarence: Oh spare me Saul Solomon. No graduate of my third grade *should* stand like that. (reaches out to adjust his posture) Head straight, young man

Saul: (slapping away her hand) Ms. Tarence?!?!

Craig: (entering, with ski mask and revolver) Give me your money, this is a hold up!

Silver, Part 3

Continued from part 1 and part 2:

Fact one: Humans are the only mammals that exude no experimentally verifiable sex pheremones. Fact two: there exists no woodland species whose male is willing to continue playing video games in the presence of a female in estrus. Though no link has been satisfactorily demonstrated in a peer-reviewed journal, and though full fault cannot be ascribed to Brian as it was still within his refractory period from their last mutual satisfaction, these two facts are clearly related. This typical Saturday night of the still-young relationship found Brian and Tony on the couch poking frantically at their controllers while Cindy flopped on the loveseat in her sweats. In a subconscious nod to the history of handling sexually aroused and arousing women by placing them in a societies composed exclusively of other women and castrati, Brian had tuned their second TV to a showing of her favorite musical, Aladdin.

The second television of their household was a relic from an ex-roommate's ex-roommate, a 60 cm job allegedly from France but of questionable enough workmanship that ex-Soviet Republic lineage was not out of the question. Most households would have junked in a second (several, in fact, already had). But Brian and Tony kept it not for its color, not for its vertical hold, certainly not for its necessitating an obscure electrical converter, and not for what its measurements were, but for what its measurements were given in. This Cold War relic was the centerpiece of their living room simply because it was measured in System Internationale Units.

Brian and Tony's house had originally been two marginally historic whose combination, so went the thoughts of one urban developer, would open up one of the lots for a 24-hour gas station/mini-mart. It was only when the houses had been uprooted and resituated that it was realized that one house was built to Imperial specifications and the other to Metric proportions. What this meant was that while the windows, doors and ceilings were of similar height, eventually the rounding error caught up and the home assumed a leitmotif of "not quite right". The architect behind this contraption of a living space came out of his drunken stupor long enough to reveal the move was a minimalistic retelling of a dialogue between prescriptivists that mimicked the something something of who cares. The art was promptly entered into the state's register of historic places and permanently saved from the demolition that passers-by perpetually wished upon it. The upside for a video store clerk and roommate of similarly moderate
ambition was that it was rent-controlled not by fickle legislators but by humanity's innate desire for consistency in aesthetics.

Many a weaker pair of decorators would have attempted to hide the disparity that comes with having a footed kitchen/dining room but a metered living room. This is roughly as intelligent as attempting to draw attention away from a hunchback with vertical stripes. Instead, Brian and Tony highlighted it. Objects were only allowed on the side of the divide where they belonged according to their primary unit of measurement. So while all their comfortable seating surfaces (couch, loveseat, a smattering of easy chairs) were on the upper, metric half of their common space, Brian and Tony, being true to their vision, kept the 30", flat screen beaut of a television that was their pride and joy just over the border of the seven-eights of an inch minus 2 centimeters (each half had been meticulously constructed and they spent one night calculating the difference) dip in the floor.

"Look, you're not going to be able to make up this deficit," said Tony.

"I've come back from worse situations."

"What? When I was drunk? As long as I'm sober, this kicking of your ass will continue. And I think we both know it."

"*WE* don't know anything. We have to wait and see it--"

"Brian, honey, are Jasmine's tits nicer than mine?" Cindy broke into the conversation.

"She's a cartoon."

"I'm not going to get mad, I promise. You can tell me what you honestly think."

"I honestly think she's a cartoon."

"You're no help. Tony?"

Tony glanced over at the Sonyski. "I'd say maybe. But I think that's just because her wardrobe is very to her advantage."

"Guys, she's a cartoon. She doesn't have tits. They're lines of ink."

Cindy weighed her bosom in her hands. "Do they bounce more naturally?"

"They can't! By definition, whatever your breasts do are natural as it can be."

"What would you say she is, Tony, D-cup?"

"Oh, at least."

"But back in those days they didn't have push-up bras. How much could they really amplify her cleavage? Maybe they're just really buoyant, like, double-Es."

Brian couldn't stand the horrible combination of inanity and insanity. "Back in those days? You mean 1994? Or are you implying that Disney, the commodifier of all that was holy, drew period costumes? Considering that half the things that came out of Robin Williams's mouth in that movie were anachronistic at best, I'm pretty sure historical fidelity was not one of their primary goals."

Tony and Cindy ignored him. She continued, "Man, this is the hardest part for girls, when we're comparing. Trying to guess how much of that is real and how much is underwire. I wish I could just," she motioned, "see them, and really know."

"There are websites," Tony said, faster than he probably should have. The conversation faded into laughter, embarrassment, and eventually embarrassed laughter.

Cindy got up from her reclined position and wandered over to behind her boyfriend. "You're so focused on your race car or horse cow or whatever that is, I feel like you're not paying attention to me."

He continue jabbing and lunging at the plastic in his hand, leaning it in the direction he was already pushing, in the shared unconscious hope of every man who was a teenager since the 80's that the game console has some hitherto undisclosed way of sensing and responding to ferocity of motion and purity of intent. "Probably true."

"You're impossible!"

"No, what's impossible is making this... jump... right... here. Oh, and I made it. How you like that, Tony? Don’t call it a comeback, I was never out of it."

She cozied up closer behind him. "You sure you wouldn't rather... play another sort of game. I know how we could involve electronics." While she said this, his head was nestled between her Golden Globe-winning golden globes.

He was affected by the temptation, as his race car or horse cow or whatever crashed and ignited into a heap of polygons ablaze. But he would not succumb to it and turned to face Tony. "'Nother game?"

"Why do I put up with you?"

"Because I don't respond to rhetorical questions?"

Cindy had little to say to that, and went into their kitchen. She looked through the cupboards, the refrigerator, and the freezer before finding what she wanted. "Anybody else want ice cream? With whip cream? Maybe some chocolate sauce?"

Tony spoke up first. "This is really cool, having a roommate who dates a movie star."

"What do you mean?"

"I learn new stuff every day. Apparently, in some cases, the camera doesn't need to add ten pounds!"

"Brian, are you going to let him talk to me like that?"

"Tony."

"Sorry. 4.5 kilograms."

Cindy playfully tossed a stuffed animal Brian and Tony had distributed around the kitchen the morning after a drunken friend had found the only throwable object in the kitchen to be a tea pot and in their drunken frame of reference thought that with the correct lobbing motion such a flight could be considered playful, resulting in a broken window and a missed tea time. She situated herself and her Haagen Dasz between the them on the couch. "Hey, Brian, can we talk?"

He didn't take his eyes of the screen. "Is this like a breaking-up talk?"

"No, no, nothing like that."

"Is it more important that, say, what we're doing for dinner tonight?"

"What is this, twenty questions? Yes, it's larger than a bread box."

"OK, based on my priorities, and the knowledge that it's less important than breaking up and more important than what we're doing for dinner, it's not important enough to end this game early, but important enough to not start another one."

"So I have to wait till the end of this game?"

"I don't think you know it well enough to help me win."

She sat for a moment, and the only sounds in the apartment were of clanking metal and battling animal-hybrids over a soundtrack of futuristic apocalyptic rock. While the boys jousted virtually, she mulled her thoughts and replayed in her mind the conversation. She contented herself to watch Aladdin (which was her favorite musical) for the next few minutes. But, really, how did they stay so pert? She asked, quite simply, "Would you enjoy it if I wore a bra while we made love."

Both of the race cows blew up at the bottom of ravines simultaneously as Brian and Tony looked at her.

"Oh, good, we can talk now. What are you doing three weeks from Sunday?"

"Umm, I think I have plans with Tony."

Tony tried to help his roommate. "Dude, that's the night of the Oscars."

Brian didn't get the message. "See, we do have plans. And I can't just bail on him."

"You can just bail on me. You must. I'd sell you to go the Oscars. Unless we were in prison. Then I'd sell you for a carton of smokes."

"Hey."

"Sorry, 20 decacigarettes."

"So, Brian," she paused, biting her lower lip, and as Brian looked at her he damned Ansel Adams for applying his photographic talent to the pale beauty of nature when faces like this existed, "will you be my date to the Academy Awards?"

Silver, Part 2

(continued from part 1)

And so he cooked her dinner. She came over to his place, expecting a wooing: posters of her (all taken *after* she turned 18, of course) decorating the place, newly-bought décor to evince a certain level of glamour. What she got was a typical twenty-something apartment, any and all style courtesy of Ikea's budget racks, with most of the t-shirts consolidated into one pile. The tablecloth was the only visible attempt to clean the place up, and it was the sort of thin plastic that one buys last-minute in the grocery store. For someone so used to the red carpet, it was new to walk into a space whose philosophy of interior decoration was afterthought.

Brian poured both of them a glass of wine. She took it and, as was polite, offered him the opportunity to show off his purchasing power and prowess. "What kind of red is this?" She settled in for a discourse on varietals and their respective bouquets--

"Umm, red?" And he went back to chopping the tomatoes. In the background he was playing a new pop tune. The band wasn't that great, and certainly weren't famous, but the song was catchy, reminded everyone who heard it of some tune they liked, and they were willing to do a cross-promotional music video. Of course, quickly, the table was set and light conversation was had. Comfortable and invigorating without being intellectually exhausting. The sun set and then the light was by candle. Of course, other dates happened later. They went ice skating (both of them were awful and said yes in the hope the other would be able to coach them as cute couples did, but instead just stumbled around the rink for an hour before succumbing to their mutual coldness). She convinced him to go jogging with her, and he survived only because she stopped to sign an autograph at the same intervals as he stopped to check if he was, in fact, as he believed having a heart attack.

As a romantic comedy fixture, Cindy had filmed many a montage and came closer than the next guy to understanding their purpose. Most people think a montage is used to show passage of time. How else would the audience understand that it was now a month later and a relationship was cemented? And this is wrong because the average audience member is not willing to accept the simple fact that audiences, of any medium are, by and large, stupid. They are willing to accept development wildly disproportionate to elapsed time.

No, the montage is the only way movies can hope to turn reality into real life. Real life is where we live. In real life, your girlfriend is the most beautiful woman on the face of the earth. Your in-jokes are the funniest, your love life the greatest. There is a spark between you. Tangible. No one in your presence could deny it. Reality, however, is that you are two clothed primates drawn together by one of yours deep-seated feelings of insufficiency and the other's ticking biological clock.

Writers cannot craft a universally compelling narrative of love because no love is universally compelling. No compliment, no matter how loaded with adoration and praise means half as much as "nice sweater" coming from a beloved. No insult, no matter how laden with profanity and tales of sexual obscenity, hurts one-thousandth as much as a lover's uncertain glance. The reason for the montage is because it is impossible to write down, in all its particulars, a relationship. No imagination, even one infinitely better than reality, can match real life.

And so, we settle for a montage of scenes of pretty people doing activities we almost believe could lead to emotion. Only teenage girls and virgins could ever truly fall in love based on what they see on the screen. The rest of us leave the theater confident in our superior capability to engage in emotion. All because of the magic of cutting from scene to scene without allowing us to see what is actually going on.

Back at dinner (for despite talking about the running and the subsequent dates, dinner hadn't really ended), dessert, a nice crème brulee that was perfect to both of them despite its objectively obvious technical shortcomings, was finished they slowly drew together, a single whisper's distance from the other's cheek--

They kissed. They smooched. They necked. And soon (by now the pop song previously alluded to had hit its romantic climax) there was nudity. And there was sex. Not the kind of gratuitous nudity so popular in today's romantic comedies where all we get is a hint of buttocks or perhaps a passing frame of nipple. Honestly, whose first post-coital instinct is to (as Meg Ryan's characters invariably do) pull the sheet up to cover precisely enough of their breasts to attain a PG-13 rating while still leaving the promise of cleavage? No, they left the sheets scattered on the floor and basked in their mutual warmth. Their relationship was not built exclusively on the sex, but it was certainly a part of it.

Of course, the montage has to have distinct start and end points, or else the audience will perpetually fear their vantage point might jump out from under them. The best technique for signaling the end is a quick and drastic change in tone, to make it clear that the emotion (i.e., the beginning of a relationship) has crescendoed and should now move on. The more abrupt and surprising the zig and/or zag, the better--

"You're Cindy Whittaker!" came a voice out of the fog of disturbed sleep.

"What? Huh?" She rolled over and quite quickly refound her bra and indignation. "Who are you?"

"That's Tony, my roommate," said Brian. "Back from Philadelphia early? Right, no matter." Brian reached for his boxers, more calmly than Cindy's frantic grabbing at items of clothing. "Do you think maybe you could give us some, y'know, privacy?"

"You're Cindy Whittaker!"

"Out!"

Tony compromised on turning around and continuing with his droning. "I'm your biggest fan, I know everyone says that, but I really am. I even saw--"

"I have to go," said Cindy, to Brian. She turned to Tony, "I'm sorry, I appreciate your fan--"

"--you in that sleeper film noir feature you did: 'Café on the Brink of Sorrow'--"

"Don't mind him," Brian said. "He won't even notice you're gone for half an hour. He does this sometimes."

"You sure, cause, I don't want this to get weird?"

"Just go." They were both clothed, and Tony had turned back around to regale her with his Cindy Whittaker fan club bona fides. "I'll see you later?"

"Umm, yeah." Then came the moment of maximum awkwardness in any social interaction: the good-bye physical contact. The essential question of which is: What is appropriate given your history and current surroundings? Though it sounds trivial and unimportant, many men have gone crazy trying to learn its calculus and reasoning.

She extended her hand right as he went to kiss her. He backed off and took her hand, right as she leaned in towards him. The two seemed doomed to a vaudevillian back and forth (over the soundtrack of Tony's recounting of her filmography) before he pulled her in to him and kissed her. Really kissed her. A kiss that was hello, goodbye, and how you doing all in one. What more was there to do? She left.

Tony slapped his roommate on the back. "Pretty fucking incredible. You're sleeping with Cindy Goddamn Whittaker. My roommate is balling Cindy Whittaker. I mean, you have to wonder what she's thinking, right?"

"What? No."

"I mean, no offense. I think you're great. But you must know what I mean. She's--" he accented each syllable as if talking to a foreigner who had a solid grasp on English only when spoken slowly and loudly "Cin-dy Whit-a-ker."

"And I'm Brian Seston."

"Are you just messing with me? She's a movie star. She could have any guy she wants." He paused. Tony had a habit of pausing right before he said the wrong thing. In many people, this would be when they reevaluate whether it was actually worth saying, but somehow Tony still always said what was on his mind. "You-- you gotta figure she's just slumming it, right?"

"Is it really so foreign a concept that she might actually like me for me."

"No, I mean, you're a cool guy. I hang out with you. I live with you, it's great, really. But, you're a video store clerk. You have been for 5 years. You're not even a manager. I know, I know, you don't have ambitions to the bourgeois. But she's famous. She's on the internet."

"Yes, she's on the internet. And that palace of urban legends, inane email forwards and videos of white guys dancing is never incorrect in deciding societal importance."

"OK, ok. I see your point. Sure, she's no different than the rest of us." Tony paused. Again. "So, her breasts-- they real?"

Silver

The first 1000 words of a story. Please, tell me if I should bother writing the rest:

Cindy Whittaker picked up the next DVD on the rack. Sissy Scoffield was "radiant and graceful" according to one of the reviewers. "Gives the performance of a lifetime," raved another. "Her obvious charm and endearing smile light up the screen," dared one critic (who had had one script anonymously rejected by every major studio and subsequently gave up attempting to create). Of course, Cindy knew better. Sissy was an anorexic shrew of an up-and-coming alcoholic, and not the best trailer-mate Cindy had ever had. She smiled knowingly and replaced the DVD to its--

"You're Cindy Whittaker," said a male perched on the precarious border of prepubescence and adolescence. "Oh my God, you're Cindy Whittaker."

"Hi."

"I'm your biggest fan. You are so-- I'm your biggest fan. I know everyone says that, but I've liked you since 'Heart Transplant'. Remember that? Straight-to-video, but I camped out anyway. Can I have your autograph? I have to have your autograph."

Cindy smiled. "Of course. What can I sign?"

"Oh, shoot. I don't think I have--" The youth searched his pockets, finding a pen, but no paper. He glanced at his loose shirt and, idea in mind, back up at her, a guilty look crossing his face. "Can I sign your breasts?" He was red before he finished saying. "I mean--" He stammered. "If you could, I mean, my chest. I don't have any paper, but you can write on skin. Really. Sometimes you have to shake the pen, but eventually the ink will--"

She laughed. It's not unusual for a teenage male to fumble contact with the opposite sex so disastrously. But in this case, he had good cause. Cindy started life as one of those adorable children who can light up an entire room and never grew out of it. Men who were talking to her would discreetly leave their wedding bands in their pockets while they conversed. And, what's more, she hadn't an inkling of the effect she had on people. Cindy Whittaker was born a movie star; she had no need to spend her childhood balancing books to learn posture or applying make-up to flatten out her nose. She just had to wait for someone to turn the camera on her.

"How about," she moved her hand past Sissy's tripe of a film to one she had starred in, opening its case and taking the boy's pen, "I sign this copy of 'Say It Like You Mean It.' Do you know that one?"

"Of course I do. I saw it three times in the theater with my girlfriend!" Her admirer would spend the rest of his adult life wondering why he admitted to her there was anyone else of a romantic nature in his life.

She gave him the signed disc and, knowing nothing else to say, he ran away. More men, she thought, would do well to follow his example of not overstaying one's welcome.

"I'll gladly pay for the movie, I'm sorry, I didn't even think--" she looked to the cashier, and fumbled in her purse for her wallet.

"How about," he said, a glint of a scheme in his eye, "I just let you rent it, and you forget to return it, and we forget to care."

"Thanks," she said, a bit suspicious. Living in Hollywood, she'd gotten used to seeing glints of schemes, and it had never turned out well. "I don't know what to say."

"Say you'll go out to dinner with me." Brian Seston realized (for that was the cashier's name) that sometimes clichés just are the right thing to say.

"Why?" Cindy had long ago gotten used to people wanting things from her; by now she was just curious about motivations.

"That kid won't stop smiling for weeks. When he referred to your--" Brian had lasted longer than most males, but like most males had found his train of thought derailed by--

"My breasts. You can say it."

"When he slipped up his statement, I thought he was going to end up crying into his pillow tonight. You're obviously able to think on your feet, so you get points for wit, and you're also charitable enough to put in the effort to spare him, so, points for some combination of pity and kindness."

Cindy wasn't used to so much praise that didn't mention her skills or her-- (I can say it) her assets. She knew it was an off-chance, but did he? Maybe she was being too vain, I mean, there's a decent chance, not everybody, "Do you know who I am?" Ohmygod that sounded too arrogant. She's not trying to get out of a speeding ticket--

"I work in a video store, Ms. Whittaker." He pointed upwards and at that moment, on 14 televisions throughout the store, there was Cindy sitting in a car and "having a bad feeling about this" in "Hitchhiking", a mediocre horror movie that grossed $32 million in its first weekend. "I know who you are."

It was Cindy's turn to be embarrassed. "How much did you say the video was?"

"3.25."

She blew a strand of her brown hair out of her face while fishing around for the bills. "If you know who I am, then why do you think I'm free for dinner for some video store clerk? I could have important photo shoots in Milan to get to. On a chartered jet." Off-putting was not Cindy's best or most-practiced mood, but she had seen other starlets use it to get out of situations made uncomfortable. She thrust the wadded-up dollars over the counter.

He took them gently and dropped them into the cashbox. "You may be a movie star. Everyone may know your name. And while I'd disagree with our shorter friend that 'Say It Like You Mean It' was an artistic apogee, I'll readily admit you were quite great in 'Mind Over Matter'. But, let's be honest: it's a Thursday afternoon and you're in a video store franchise paying to rent your own movie. I think you have time for a quiet meal."

And Now for Something Completely Different...
Three Lymericks about Sex...

I.
On account of the Clintons' good will
Was I asked to their copulative drill.
Bill handled foreplay
in a sensuous way
Penetration was provided by Hill'.

II.
O! Would that I were Nick Lachay
And wed to fair Jess for one day.
I'd bind her with rope
and jerk off on the dope
'Cuz I'm sure she's a miserable lay.

III.
I chanced upon Spears on the street
And did drop my drawers to my feet.
"Fortune favors the bold",
or so I was told
By her guard as he Tazered my meat.

d.r.f.cummings. (tehee)

(scene 5) (the same as scene 1: a party, with subscenes)

(scene 5a)

(enter Guy and Randall)

(in the corner of the party is Horny, making out with the never-before-mentioned William)

Randall: Look, you're going to have fun tonight. You need to have fun tonight. I need you to have fun tonight.

Guy: OK, I'll try. (walks in, sees them) (freezes)

Randall: What? You haven't even stood in line for crappy beer yet--

Guy: No. That's, that's--

Randall: (looks over, but only sees William with a girl he's had less experience identifying) Cause of, that? I mean, yeah, we all think William's a tool. An automated electronic tool. A tool box. A goddamn Home Depot. But you can't let it get to your head just cause he's getting some and you're not. Whatever, a girl who would make out with him? At this kind of party? She's just some sort of slut. Whatever. Fuck that guy and that ho any--(they shift, and it's obviously her) Oh.

(sub-scene)

(scene 5b)

(Needs-to-be-Popular is talking to a few friends. Drunk is hanging on her)

Popular: I just don't know how she could be dating him-- (general agreement from friends)

Guy: (cutting in) Hey, hun, could we talk?

Popular: Yeah, sure. (they step away) (tagged-by drunk)

Guy: So... I haven't seen you much since-- I mean, I know it's only been three weeks, but, I guess it's just weird cause we used to see each other--

Drunk: So, yeah, I'm hooking up with someboedy now.

Guy: Yeah, I sorta got that when I saw you--

Drunk: OK, bye! I need another shot. Who wants to do a shot? (does one that's stationed at a table, runs off)

(sub-scene)

(scene 5c)

(guy is sitting on a couch, hanging with his head back, when Needy walks up)

Needy: Hi. How are you doing?

Guy: (seeing her, finishes his drink deliberately in response) All right. What's up?

Needy: (crashing on the couch) Oh (sigh) I guess I'll be all right, just... th-

Guy: What?

Needy: Well, I had a midterm today. --(tagged-by unexplained coldness)

Guy: What class?

Unexplained Coldness: Nevermind.

Guy: O...K. (pause) Well, I hope everything works out okay. (goes to pat her on the back in an attempt to be... conciliatory? Helpful?)

Unexplained Coldness: Don't-- don't touch.

Guy: Check. Well, I need to freshen-- I need a drink.

(sub-scene)

(scene 5d)

(Guy's standing, Girl walks over to him)

Girl: Hi.

Guy: Oh, hi.

Girl: Have you done anything at this part other than avoid and try to talk to me?

Guy: I've certainly--

Girl: Say it.

Guy: Say what? (she looks at him) OK, fine. How could you be hooking up with him? I'm so much cooler than he is. Ugh, are you trying to drive me crazy?

Girl: Sweetie, of course not.

Guy: Cause, well, I'm not proud of it, but the idea of you, and him. I'm so much cooler--

Girl: And if it were someone cooler than you you'd be just as crazy about it, except it would have blown your self-confidence and so instead of being at this party you'd be sucking your thumb in that one corner of your room. And if he were exactly as cool as you, you'd be freaked out more than you can imagine by the similarities. I know you, you'd sit down and list them.

Guy: OK. Are you two dating?

Girl: I hope not. If I wanted a boyfriend, we'd still be going out. So, are we better now? Can we get back to the prior business of partying?

Guy: Yeah, sure.

Girl: If you have something to say, say it. (tagged-by Popular, but they only get part way to changing the dress before she says the next line)

Guy: No, no.

Popular: OK, fine. (tagged-by Girl)

Guy: Wait, if we talk, can I talk to you?

Girl: Of course-- what do you mean? Who else would you talk to?

Guy: One of your other personalities. Do you not realize this? Yeah, there's you, and I love-d you. And then there are the others. (pulling them off the bench they sit on) There's the needy you, which I at least knew how to deal with. There's drunk you, who is endearing, but won't let you forget it, even when she does. There's the Unexplained Coldness, the time with you when we were sitting next to each other and even talking, but not connecting. There's the you that Needs-to-be-popular and the one with Worldly Ambitions. Those are interesting, because that's having to be accepted by people younger than you and older than you, respectively. And then, how can we forget everyone's favorite dwarf: Sleazy.

Girl: That's very convenient for you, isn't it? Breaking me into those parts. You think you've got me covered?

Guy: I spent a lot of time observing you. Especially when you wouldn't talk to me. Just sitting there, limply holding hands.

Girl: OK, well, how about this one? The Motherly side of me.

Guy: I-- I don't know that one.

Girl: That's right, you don't. She never got a chance to come out in our relationship. You were always so good at taking care of me, but you were pretty lousy at being taken care of.

Guy: Well, you're complex. I wasn't sure that you'd be there-- I wasn't sure if I could trust you.

Girl: (during this speech, she pulls out his personalities, which we hadn't even thought about. Aha!) It showed. And do you think you're so damn simple yourself? You would sometimes be amazing at bringing out the best in people in simple conversation. And then I'd come over, and you'd be too busy playing online chess to notice I wore the shirt of your favorite band.

Chess: But it's timed, and this one's rated!

Girl: You can go from giving your friends the best hugs in the world to suddenly being silent whenever anyone else enters the conversation. Where do you find inside yourself to hide? And why? What happens to the boy who always has to call me after he drops me off to make sure he was properly understood? And how is he possibly the same guy who can't resist the temptation of a bad joke? (to the Joker guy) Weather's here.

Joker: Wish you were beautiful.

(just to clarify, at this point, the stage is full of, like, 15 personalities)

Girl: And then there's the you that's not quite horny, but treats sex like you're a kid in a candy store, looking to get one of every type of grope and nuzzle. You're ridiculous!

Guy: Why did we break up?

Girl: Because you wanted to.

Guy: And then I changed my mind. Why did we stay broken up?

Girl: Because I was happy being single. Because I knew I couldn't marry you.

Guy: Y'know how it seems to me? It's like we bought a car together. And I had never had a car before. So I was disappointed when the car wouldn't go, like, 700 mph, and that you had to put some effort into it, change the oil, wipe the windshield. Cause I had only see cars in movies, and you never have to do that in movies. So I was like, "let's return the car." And you were like, "uh, okay." Then a week later, I come back to you and say "wait, I was wrong." And you were like, "I like walking."

Girl: Haha. That's an awesome way of putting it!

Guy: I don't know how you can see that and not agree with me that we should still be together.

Girl: Because I don't feel that way anymore. I'm sorry, I don't. No, I take that back, I'm not sorry. I'm not trying to feel that way. I don't. I still think you're great, but--

Guy: But you could. It's possible you could feel that way.

Girl: That's like saying it's possible to walk to the moon.

Guy: No, no. They're completely different. That's not possible, in the universe.

Girl: When you're talking about feelings, how I feel is how the universe works. How can you feel this way? You're the one who just told me how I was an awful and schizophrenic girlfriend. We were lucky to get five good minutes together in a row.

Guy: But those five minutes. Most people are lucky to get five minutes those good in their life. There's no one I'd rather have mutual, poorly-timed, reinforcing mood swings with. I don't know how you could give them up so easily.

Girl: Maybe I just got greedy and now I want something where I can have 10 minutes in a row. Or 15. Or maybe a whole day. Or more.

Guy: But until then, it's worth a month of unexplained coldness.

Girl: There's the thing, it may have been unexplained coldness, but it was never unexplainable.

Guy: So why didn't you? So why don't you? I'm listening.

Girl: Because sometimes you just can't talk about them. Ugh. Why must you gloss over all the problems and just focus on the positive.

Guy: Oh, I don't gloss over anything. It's just that you see the positive and the negative. I see the positive and what could be fixed.

Girl: Great. Then fix it with the next girl.

Guy: Why can't the next girl be the last girl? (she's bothered by that statement) Look, yeah, there was a lot of stuff that I disliked. And stuff about you that grated me. It did. Stuff that I knew was never going to change some I've told you about, some I didn't even bother. Cause I knew it would make no difference. Sometimes you really frustrated me.

Girl: Then stop wanting to go out with me. Find someone perfect for you. You're right, it was pretty great. And the way to honor that isn't be fawning. The best thing I can say for our relationship is this: it's worth being honest about.

(scene)

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Devils in a Blue Dress -- Third Scene

(as continued from the first scene and the second scene)

(scene 3)

(setting: Guy's room. Desk with computers. Nightstand. The one prop that takes work is the bed: It's on a hinge, so while it's often the horizontal that we've all come to know and love in our slumber, it can be lifted to vertical, so that the actors can be lying down, but still visible)

(Guy is asleep in bed. Bed is vertical. Knock on door.)

Guy: (sleepily, waking up) Huh, yeah, who's there? (begins to get out of bed, with the bed tilting back down to horizontal as he gets up)

Needy: (from outside door) Me. (opens door, enters) Hi.

Guy: (bolts up, more awake because it's her) Hey you...

Needy: Did I wake you up? Oh, I should just go...

Guy: No, no. What time is it?

Needy: (looks at watch) 3:12.

Guy: Yes, you did. But, I'm up no--

Needy: (she rushes up and hugs him)

Guy: You're all wet.

Needy: I walked home from the party. (looks at desk she just passed) Oh, I'm sorry, I forgot, you're a computer person, you don't like water.

Guy: No, the computers don't like water, we computer people are afraid of sunlight.

Needy: I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to break any--

Guy: What's up?

Needy: It's raining outside.

Guy: I can tell, let's get you some clothes. (look at boxer-ed self) me too.

Needy: So, I was at Alpha Rho's Flapper Party, and, well, I think they were mixing the drinks a little strong. (tagged-by Drunk)

Drunk: I'm drunk.

Guy: Drunk I can deal with. Here, let's get you some water. (sit on the bed, which stays horizontal)

Drunk: I drank a lot.

Guy: I don't doubt that for a second.

Drunk: And I didn't boot that much.

Guy: I-- I wasn't going to ask. Can I do anything for that?

Drunk: I'm good now.

Guy: (aside) wash sheets tomorrow, check.

Drunk: And I can't believe I told Brian! Oh my god, how could I have told Brian?

Guy: Told Brian what?

Drunk: I told Brian... the same thing I told Tony. And Jessica. And that girl from my chemistry section. Y'know, the one who's always chewing bubble gum.

Guy: No, I don't. I'm not in your chemistry section. What did you tell them?

Drunk: I can't tell you, too! I already told too many people tonight.

Guy: OK.

Drunk: I'm drunk. And tired.

Guy: Me too.

Drunk: I should sleep.

Guy: Oh, well, hey, listen, you can take the bed and I'll--

Drunk: (pulls him down with her, arm around him) This is really nice.

Guy: OK. (bed turns to vertical as he says this) Well, this isn't how I would have written the night, but...

Drunk: Ah! (tagged-by Ambitious)

Ambitious: Shit shit shit shit shit. (she jumps out of bed right as Drunk was settling down, this is represented by the bed falling back to horizontal, as Ambitious gets up, but Guy isn't prepared for this in either the physical or emotional sense, so he falls with the bad)

Guy: (getting up, again) Wait, what?

Ambitious: I have to talk to my writing tutor.

Guy: What, now?

Ambitious: I have a paper due on Monday, and it needs to be good. I'm going to spend all tomorrow working on it, it's a really good idea, but I need to know what to do--

Guy: It's (looks) 3:16 in the morning.

Ambitious: Well, how about I just call her cell phone number, and if she picks up, we can talk.

Guy: Because if she picks up and you talk, you'll still be drunk.

Ambitious: I can text message her! That will show devotion.

Guy: Drunk text messaging is the only idea worse than drunk dialing, especially to a writing tutor. It's a medium that could make even Jincy Willett's mediocre, with all those misspellings and elided words.

Ambitious: Who? (tagged-by Needy)

Guy: Shakespeare, I couldn't have said Shakespeare?

Needy: I shouldn’t call her.

Guy: No.

Needy: Then I don't know what to do.

Guy: There's nothing to do.

Needy: But after what I said.

Guy: Well, I guess I don't know that. You sure you don't want to--

Needy: No.

Guy: OK. Well, you probably don't want to have to walk home out there, but I'm not sure what I can do if you want to talk about it, but you won't tell me.

Needy: Can I just lie here? I'll leave as soon as you fall asleep, I promise--

Guy: (struck) Sure. (they climb back into bed until it goes vertical)

Guy: Good night.

Girl: (replaces Needy after he says that) I told them about my breast reduction.

Guy: Oh.

Girl: I had a breast reduction surgery in high school.

Guy: I mean, is that really so bad? Why don't you want people to know?

Girl: For the same reason I didn't want the breasts: it makes me stand out and feel uncomfortable.

Guy: Oh, I'm sorry.

Girl: No, it's all right. I'm, I'm feeling all right talking about it to you. I was just showing everyone my boobs and asking them if they thought the doctors did as good a job as I did.

Guy: You were showing everyone your boobs and you were feeling odd because you told them you had a surgery?

Girl: Oh whatever. Who hasn't seen tits, y'know? But I was just pandering for approbation.

Guy: Well, if it helps at all, I definitely think your boobs are small. (fumbles, bumbles) smaller! But still, you know, a nice size.

Girl: (laughs)

Guy: That wasn't the right thing to say.

Girl: No. How would you like it if I told you it was a... nice size?

Guy: I'm sorry, I'm so sorry.

Girl: No, it's all right. You may not have said the right thing, but you said it the right way.

Guy: OK, I'm not sure I know what you mean--

Girl: Hey, weren't you trying to sleep?

Guy: Oh, yeah. (falls silent)

Girl: (after a time, kisses him)

Guy: Oh.

Girl: Yeah.

Guy: Look, I dunno how this is going to go. We had, like, a date.

Girl: And it went horribly. But-- (they start hooking up more. Her dress comes off)
you're going to enjoy this. (is tagged-by Horny. Horny is handed the dress and starts to put it on, but then thinks, "why bother", and throws it to the side)

(they begin foreplay as lights fade)

(scene 3a, the next morning)

(in bed, Guy and Unexplained Coldness)

Guy: Good morning!

Unexplained Coldness: Uh, good morning.

Guy: Look, I'm going to be honest with you.

Unexplained Coldness: OK, great.

Guy: When I woke up, I thought that maybe, I dunno, it would be easiest if we just put our clothes on underneath the covers and called it a night.

Unexplained Coldness: Can't say I'm--

Guy: And then I realized last night was too wonderful. I'm sorry that whatever happened to you, and it will be fine, but this, us, this is what we wait for. We're going to find a city and we're going to walk around a shopping district and hold hands and I'm going to buy you things. And I don't care if you have morning-after awkwardness or indecent indifference or even beer goggle regret. I'm going to make you as happy to wake up next to me as I was to wake up next to you.

But first, breakfast. I'm going to squeeze the brightest oranges trees can make. I'm going to find you as many eggs as you want. Or, no, just, one ostrich egg. Or if you like cold cereal, the largest box of Honey Bunches with Oats there's ever been. Just speak the words. So, what's for breakfast?

Girl: (replacing Unexplained Coldness) Come here and I'll tell you. (he leans in, she kisses him tenderly) me. (is replaced by Horny, who throws the dress to the other side of the room)

(scene)

"The Smiths' Christmas wasn't quite merry,
For they had their brave first-born to bury.
At the wake they did scowl
at Secret'ry Powell.
Don't blame him, Smiths, he voted for Kerry."

Dan W. Foster

Devils in a Blue Dress -- Second Scene

This is a continuation of, not suprisingly, the first scene of this one act.


(scene 2)

(at dinner, in a restaurant, with the girl. The meal is finished, the plates dirty but not picked up.)

Guy: No, I do want to know about you. I'm just not writing the back of a trading card: "Spent six years at Richard Nixon Elementary, two as a starter before being called up by Gerald Ford Middle School. Traded one season later to sunny California and Loma Verde High School for one Vending Machine and three textbooks to be named at a later date." I want to know you, and the facts about you only as much as they help towards the first goal.

Girl: Let's see: I'm the daughter of a New Mexican Research Scientist and a transported Southern Belle Debutante, which explains why I have a knack for math and a shaky body image. I spent last summer interviewing sex workers for a documentary, which means I know all their tricks. And my uncle's a stamp collector, which means I know it's not dirty to be philatelic.

Guy: I'm really glad you decided to come out to dinner to me.

Girl: Me too.

Guy: My strategy paid off.

Girl; You had a strategy?

Guy: Of course. If I had asked you out while you were, I dunno, swimming with dolphins or being fed peeled grapes by Abercrombie models, I probably would have gotten a quick no if you'd even bothered responding. But by asking you while you were stuck caring for a pukey friend, relatively, I was God's gift to women.

Girl: Do you really think it's wise to enter a relationship as the lesser of two evils?

Guy: This was a nice dinner. The food was passable, the service mediocre, but the company superb. (Y'know that moment right before a kiss when you're both silent and the world is calm? Yeah. That. Except, there's no traiditional post-pre-kiss kiss. Because Plot Device Girl has entered the restaurant, with Needs-to-be-Popular on her arm (unclothed), and comes up to Girl. At the recognition that PDG is present, Girl is tagged-by Needs-to-be-Popular)

PDG: Hi!

Girl: Oh, hey.

PDG: I didn't think I'd run into you here. Don't you love this place?

Needs-to-be-Popular: Yeah, totally. (standing). Lindsay, do you know--

Guy: We've met.

PDG: Yeah, hi.

Popular: So, did you hear about Wendy and Brad?

PDG: No.

Popular: Well, you know how she's been basically throwing herself at him for the past two months.

PDG: Doesn't he have a long-term girlfriend?

Popular: Well, yes, but last Tuesday, her picture moved from next to his bed to the bookshelf off in the corner.

PDG: Ah, commitment through photography, the surest sign cheating is about to begin.

Popular: Wait for it. Last night, she told him that old joke, "What do you do to an elephant with three balls?"

PDG: I dunno, what?

Popular: Walk him, and pitch to the rhino.

PDG: It's not the greatest joke, but, nothing not to hook up with a girl over.

Popular: Except, Brad (holds three fingers over her crotch)

PDG: No!

Popular: Carrying a spare, yep!

PDG: Is that even possible? It violates everything I know about bilateral symmetry.

Popular: During the draft for World War Two, there were nine documented cases in America alone.

PDG: Does that get you out of the draft?

Popular: Hmm, I dunno. Yes?

PDG: Why?

Popular: Bigger target?

PDG: How do you know all that?

Popular: Well, when he gets drunk, Brad can't stop talking about his condition. He can barely stop showing it off.

PDG: Eww.

Popular: Well, let's just say, he seems to have an extra portion in other places, too.

PDG: Oh my god, you're too funny. She's outrageous, you know that?

Guy: I'd been getting the impression.

PDG: OK, I have to get going. But will I see you at Kara's party tonight?

Popular: Oh, sure. (PDG exits) (sitting again) Wow. She's the type of girl I never thought I was cool enough to be friends with, but then I got to college, and look at that. Asking me to the party. (tagged-by Ambition)

Guy: Very cool, I have to admit.

Ambition: So, what was I saying? Oh yeah, well, I want to make films. This school doesn't offer a major in it, but I found a professor who liked me. I took his seminar, and he kept asking me, "what year are you? A senior", and I was like, "no, freshman," and he would say, "well, you're the best writer in the class."

Guy: That is rather impressive.

Ambition: So, I'll probably design my own major, which he'll approve cause he likes me. Then go on to grad school at, I dunno, somewhere in New York or LA.

Guy: It sounds like you have a solid plan.

Ambition: Are you patronizing me? Look, I've had people not believe in me before, so it might be easier for both of us if you're honest. (tagged-by Unexplained Coldness)

Guy: No, I mean it, you sound like you have a very good idea of what you want to do, and perhaps more importantly, how to get there.

Unexplained Coldness: OK.

Guy: Great. So, like, I was saying, I really think that this dinner has been great.

Unexplained Coldness: Sure.

Guy: I'm sorry, did, did I do something wrong?

Unexplained Coldness: Why would you think that?

Guy: Oh, nothing.

Unexplained Coldness: Good.

Guy: Cause if I did, I'd love to make it better.

Unexplained Coldness: Could we just -- you know.

Guy: Yeah, sure. (long pause as they pick at dinner remains) What lesser-known meat would you try, if you could?

Unexplained Coldness: What?

Guy: Or, more specifically, lesser-known meat from Australia? Kangaroo, Koala, Duck-billed Platypus?

Unexplained Coldness: What are you talking about? Do you really think that that's a way to get to know me? Asking me nonsensical questions just to make yourself appear witty? Anybody can think of three funny words to string together. Look, I'll do it: gopher, fellatio, shoehorn.

Guy: (after a bit more of a pause) (to the waitress) Check!

(scene)

Devils in a Blue Dress -- First Scene

Apologies for absence. Here is scene from my first play that could maybe be about love. Because you can be a funny hack just writing jokes all your life, but still a hack.

Persons:

• Guy
  
• Girl
  
  
  
  • Girl.
    
  • Drunk.
    
  • Needs-to-be-popular.
    
  • Needy.
    
  • Motherly.
    
  • Horny.
    
  • Unexplained Coldness.
    
  • Worldly ambitions.
    
  
  
• Randall. Guy's best friend.
  
• Plot Device Girl: A highly developed character
  

(A note of explanation: The girl is not just 8 facets, but 8 actresses. The physical body of the girl is represented by, surprise, a blue dress. And whichever one is wearing the dress is the personality you might see in the girl at that moment. Ideally, the actresses who were not in the dress would be naked, to expose their vulnerability, ephemerality, and boobies. But, let's face it, I'll never find 8 of those, so let's say they're wearing matching bra/panty sets.)

Scene 1: A party. Debauchery all around. Music blaring. Between each mini-scene, scenelet, scenette the lights fall for about 5 seconds.

Scene 1a:

Randall: Isn't this awesome?

Guy: What?

Randall: What?

Guy: (getting louder to be heard) This is too loud. I can't even hear myself being sexually frustrated.

Randall: What?

Guy: I can't even hear (music cuts out. Room is silent) myself being sexually frustrated.

Randall: The sudden silence. Tough break kid.

Guy: I could have stopped early, but then everyone would have just heard "myself being sex".

Randall: Lesser of two evils. Quite. See you at home?

Guy: When will you be home?

Randall: (getting pulled off by a girl) If I'm not home by Tuesday, wait till Thursday.

Scene 1b:

(picks up right after introductions)

Girl: Nice to meet you, too.

Guy: Nice dress.

Girl: Thanks. (tagged-by Popular)

Popular: Where do you live?

Guy: (shaking head) Oh no.

Popular: What?

Guy: Where do I live, what am I taking, where am I from, what am I majoring in, no, not going to do it. I've done it too much for one lifetime.

Popular: OK, then I guess I'm not sure what to--

Guy: Kill one: puppy or kitten.

Popular: What? (tagged by Girl)

Guy: Fine. Falling off a cliff, one on each side, kitten and puppy, you can only get to one in time, which do you save? See, far less moral culpability.

Girl: Are you always like this?

Guy: Only when I have to be.

Girl: Kitten. Cuter. Cuddlier. Intelligent enough to actually be your companion. You?

Guy: Puppy. And here's why: If the situation were reversed, and it was you on one side of the cliff, puppy on the other, the kitten would just sit there, batting its eyelashes. The puppy would at least come over and try to play as you fell to your death.

Plot Device Girl: (to girl, who's getting replaced by Popular) C'mon, let's go, Cindy and Jake are totally about to hook up. You should come with us.

Popular: OK, I'm sorry, I've got to go--

Guy: (to girl) I'll see you later, don't worry. (to Popular) Nice to meet you, too.

(mini-scene)

scene 1c:

Drunk: (stumbles upon him, as he's talking to others, who are also happy to talk without him, so it's all on the DL) You! I know you!

Guy: Yes you do.

Drunk: Do you remember me?

Guy: Yes.

Drunk: So you remember me?

Guy: Yes.

Drunk: You re--

Guy: Are you drunk? (puts his arm around her)

Drunk: And a little stoned.

Guy: Congratu--

Drunk: I love weed.

Guy: And I'm sure it loves you.

Drunk: We met. Do you remember me?

Guy: (holding and talking sense into her) I am never going to forget you. Ever. Not even a little. Not even for a minute.

Drunk: Do I know you?

(mini-scene)

scene 1d:
(Motherly is by a toilet, helping a friend puke)
Motherly: It's all right, honey. Let it all come out--

Plot Device Girl: I can't believe he thought he could-- (pukes)

Motherly: Yeah, I didn't mean talking. There we go. Let it all come out.

Guy: When last I saw you, you were the one needing taking care of.

Motherly: I'm sobererer than she. Than her.

Guy: Ah, the prodigal daughter.

Motherly: Do you even know what that means? (tagged-by Girl)

Guy: No, but on a good day I can spell it.

Girl: Why me?

Guy: That had neither a verb nor a subject, and barely an object, but you really must think that's a sentence, huh?

Girl: You seem to like me, why? You don't know me.

Guy: What was the last book you read?

Girl: The Golden Gate.

Guy: By Vikram Seth. That's why I'm interested in you.

Girl: OK. Why do I like you? (Plot Device Girl starts to puke again. Motherly takes over just in time, but doesn't put on the whole dress. Instead, she just gets her arm through the hole, and is one-handedly holding back hair while girl and guy engage in conversation)

Guy: You obviously have your hands full. You'll find out at dinner Tuesday why you're interested in me.

(scene)

Here's a little ditty for the philosophy majors out there:

In conversation with yours truly,

Ethics Tutor: "Your paper [on moral subjectivism] is lucid, thorough and quite good. There are, however, some elements of unargued dogmatism. Its very...Continental."

Worst...........Insult.................Ever

"Has anyone at Oxford seen God?"
was I asked, and replied with a nod:
"I was told to expect Her
at a philosophy lecture,
But She's lost down in Christ Church's quad."

Today's Limerick by Fosterius.

Daniel R. Foster

TOMBE’S PROOF

A Play in One Act


CHARACTERS

Dr. Adam Tombe: Stuart Professor of Philosophy; in his early to mid-thirties.

Dr. Saul Kripke: Professor Emeritus of Logic; a friend and mentor of Tombe’s; in his early sixties.

David: A doctoral candidate; a friend and pupil of Tombe’s; in his early twenties.

Eva Rippen: A beautiful fourth-year undergrad; twenty-one years old.

Eva’s female friend.

Mrs. Swanson: A prominent university Trustee.

Martin: An eccentric local and friend of Tombe’s.


SETTING

Princeton University, New Jersey. Fall.




SCENE I

Early morning—Tombe’s office. Stage lights slightly, to reveal a small, cluttered room. Bookshelves line the walls and are filled with crudely organized volumes. Tombe is seated behind a desk, which is strewn with papers and opened books. He is wearing an old corduroy blazer and an unbuttoned white dress shirt over a white t-shirt. He has a sad, confused look on his face. Opposite him, acting as a bookend on one of the shelves, is a small granite bust of Socrates.


Tombe: I know in my heart that I’m not the first man to reach the conclusions I’ve reached.

(There is a long pause)

I know there must have been others—a brilliant, miserable line of bearded bastards descending from Descartes—fumbling one step closer to the end, one after another. And Nietzsche, on his perpetual death bed, arrogantly scratching away the artifice of 5,000 years of Western civilization…he must have just glimpsed the cataclysm as the weak body took its last weak breath.

(He looks at the statue of Socrates)

How about you, old man? Did you see it in your hemlock just before you took a drink? No, you didn’t. Not you. You lived in blissful fucking ignorance. You had the luxury of talking about VIRTUE and TRUTH, as if—as if they were REAL. As if they were as real as THIS.

(He stands and tears a sheet of paper from a notebook on the desk, holding it half crumpled, his balled fist between his face and Socrates’, as if to show him.)

(Several moments pass as he calms himself and lowers the paper).

No…It can’t be right. It can’t…My God, seven steps…seven simple propositions from here to oblivion…It’s…It’s just too damned simple. It’s wrong. It’s flawed. That’s the only reasonable explanation. I had a little too much bourbon after dinner, stared at the Dali paintings in the gallery for a little too long, and came back to the office and wrote a hell of a brain-tease. That’s all it is. A fucking brain tease.

(He finishes crumpling the paper and lets it fall to the ground. He looks at his pocket watch)

Chrissakes…sixteen hours. Pull it together, Tombe. You’re talking to yourself.

(He starts to button his shirt and tuck it into his khaki pants)

You’ll go to Corwin Hall and you’ll give your lecture and you’ll forget about this proof.

(Finished with his shirt, he smoothes his hair, picks up a worn briefcase, and heads toward the door. Halfway there, he turns around, picks up the crumpled paper and puts it in his jacket pocket.)

Lights Fade.


SCENE II

Later that morning—lecture hall. Stage lights to reveal a raised lectern upstage and a chalk board behind it, covered with odd symbols. Downstage are the first few rows of what is presumably a much larger hall. About half the seats are filled. Tombe stands at the lectern, half-turned toward the board and gesturing with a piece of chalk. His voice and demeanor are clearly preoccupied.

Tombe: …So, essentially, everything we do in Propositional calculus—conjunction, disjunction, negation, implication and equivalence—it can all be done with this one operation: the Sheffer Stroke…Everything, an entire universe of reason in the flick of your wrist. Seems too easy, doesn’t it?.........Uh, anyway, for next time, finish Russell. That is all.
(As the class gets up to leave, Tombe begins to gather papers from the lectern and places them in his briefcase. Lights dim slightly upstage; lights brighten downstage, where Eva and her friend talk quietly)
Friend: Isn’t it customary to fuck a professor while you’re actually taking his class?
Eva: That’s too obvious. If you do it in the fall and then take his course in the spring, it’s more subtle. And it isn’t about getting an A anyway. I can get an A on my own.
(Upstage, Tombe is taking the crumpled up paper out of his pocket and slowly unfolding and smoothing it.)
Friend: So what is it about? The sex? I mean, he’s sort of good looking for an older guy, but…
Eva: I guess it’s about the sex. But it’s also about getting inside his head. You know, exploring his genius.
Friend: Eva, just because the guy has ‘doctor’ in front of his name doesn’t mean he’s a genius. Remember Dr. Stadler from English last semester? Guy was an idiot.
Eva: Tombe has two Ph.D.s actually—one in Philosophy from Oxford, and one in Set Theoretic Mathematics from MIT. He also has masters in Political Theory, Particle Physics and Cognitive Psychology.
Friend: Fine. He gets around. Listen, just be careful, ok? These intellectual types can be weird.
(Upstage Tombe folds the paper and puts it back in his jacket pocket. Eva notices that he is about to leave)
Eva: I will, don’t worry. I have to go catch him. See you later.
(Eva hurries toward Tombe, friend exits stage right, shaking her head)
Eva: Um, excuse me, Dr. Tombe?
Tombe: (Turning to look) Uh, yes, Miss…Miss…I’m sorry…I seem to have forgotten your name.
Eva: Oh, it’s Eva. Eva Rippen.
Tombe: Eva? I don’t think I remember an Eva on the class list—
Eva: Oh, I’m not in this course, I just came to see you lecture. I’m actually trying to get into your seminar in the spring. I’m just such a huge fan of your work.
Tombe: Thank you, I didn’t realize philosophers had ‘fans’.

(She blushes coyly)

Eva: Do you mind if I ask why you’re teaching freshman logic?

Tombe: Uh, I don’t know, really. I guess there’s something about uncorrupted minds.

Eva: (With some very flirtatious body language) Well, your students must love working with you.

Tombe: (Noticing Eva’s apparent attraction) I hope so. Listen, Eva. I have go…I have to talk to an old friend in the department. But if you like, stop by my office and we’ll see about the senior seminar.

Eva: Thank you, Dr…I, I wondered actually…if you might be able to meet me later tonight? For dinner or something… I just have so many questions I’d like to ask you about your last book. I just loved your treatise on the mind-body problem.

Tombe: (Smiling) Eva, dead men write treatises. Living ones write papers.

(She smiles, he hesitates, both intrigued and uncomfortable)

I have a function to go to tonight at the alumni club, but after that…I suppose I can meet you at that coffee shop across from the library. Say, nine o’clock?

Eva: That sounds fantastic! I’ll see you then Dr. Tombe.

(She exits stage left. He exits stage right. Lights fade)




SCENE III

Later that day—Another office. Stage lights to reveal an office similar to Tombe’s. However, the bookshelves are more neatly organized, the desk is clear except for a pen and legal pad, and in place of the bust of Socrates etc. are other bits of decoration. Seated at the desk is Saul Kripke, a small, solid man with balding gray hair and beard.

(There is a knock)

Kripke: Yes?

(Tombe enters)

Kripke: Adam! Come in, come in. I wondered how long I’d have to stay in town and wait for you to drop in on me.

(Kripke turns and reclines in his chair. Tombe takes a seat in front of the desk and to one side, so that the two are basically in profile to the audience).

Tombe: Yeah, I’m sorry, Saul. It’s been kind of a rough week.

Kripke: (Lightly) Rough how, Adam? Are your awards cluttering up your mantle? Are you having trouble keeping your grant money straight?

Tombe manages a polite smile, but it quickly fades.

Kripke: But seriously, what is it? It’s that doctoral candidate you’ve taken on isn’t it? The new boy wonder, what’s his name?

Tombe: David

Kripke: Yes, David. It’s him, isn’t it? You’ve realized he exceeds you in intelligence and it’s sent you into a deep depression.

Tombe: No, I’ve never thought David was lacking in genius. But he could use more focus. He’s more concerned with what’s socially remedial or psychological healthy than what is consistent, what is true, what is valid.

Kripke: Yes. While you want to be God, David’s perfectly content with being Christ.

(Both men laugh briefly. Tombe’s smile again fades and he sighs)

Tombe: (after a pause) Saul…logic is sound, isn’t it?

Kripke: Whose logic, Adam? Mine? I’m an old man; my logic gets less sound with each passing day.

Tombe: (Another polite smile) No, I mean…are the Frenchmen right? Are we just sitting in our ivory towers playing truth games?

Kripke: Adam, if it’s reassurance you want, I’m afraid you’re in the wrong decade. You know as well as I do that there is a new assault on human reason every day of the week—its limits, its mistakes, its delusions and deceptions, on and on. Heck, if you want to read about the trouble with axiomatic systems, I suggest you dust off your own dissertation. But the basics—if p then q, causality, proof—I’d like to think we have a pretty good handle on them.

Tombe: Yeah…yeah, I suppose you’re right.

Kripke: I’ll tell you what, Adam. We’ll round up a young postmodernist from the department, go get a cup of coffee, and have a nice dialectic on the whole thing. How’s that sound?

Tombe: (Rubbing eyes) Coffee sounds good, but what I’d really like is a cigarette.

Kripke: Shameful. You haven’t smoked in years, why start again now?

Tombe: Oh, something I’m working on. I’m testing a proof, and I know there’s a formal flaw, but I just can’t spot it. Cigarettes used to help me think.

Kripke: Well, by some trick of the cosmos, you are in luck. I happen to have a pack.
(Produces pack of cigarettes from desk drawer)

Tombe: (Surprised) What are you doing with a pack of cigarettes, Saul? You’ve never smoked…

Kripke: (Suddenly bewildered). I…I don’t really know actually. I was filling the car up this morning and…it just…occurred to me that I should buy it…strange now that I think about it...

(Tombe stands, accepts the pack, and starts for the door)

Tombe: Thanks for the cigarettes, but I’ll have to take a rain check on the coffee. I’m going to try and have another look at this proof before the banquet tonight.

Kripke. Well, you’ve aroused my curiosity. Care to tell me what it is you’re working on?

Tombe: …Not yet. If I’m wrong it would be embarrassing, and if I’m right well…well, I’m not sure I want to be right.

Kripke: (Jokingly) What have you done, Adam? Disproved the existence of God?

Tombe: Oh, no. No…this is much bigger than God…I’ll see you at the banquet, Saul.

(Tombe exits, lights fade)


SCENE IV

Later that day—a park. At stage center there is a small tree. Beneath it there is a chess table with two chairs. Martin is sitting in one of the chairs, arranging pieces on the board. He wears a mix of tattered garb from various eras, including but not limited to: a black bowler cap and black cut-off gloves, a white cravat, a silver waistcoat, knickerbockers and black buckled shoes etc. In the background we hear birds chirping and the occasional sound of children at play. Tombe enters stage right, studying a wrinkled piece of paper intently.

Tombe: (to himself). It’s right…Damn it all, it’s right and there’s not a thing I can do about it.

Martin: (Noticing Tombe) Perfect timing, my good doctor. I’ve just set up the board.

(Tombe sits opposite Martin and immediately moves a piece on the board)

Tombe: How are things, Martin?

Martin: Oh, fine, fine. That new flight of sparrows had a mighty hunger this morn. But fear not, I had bread and seed for one and all.

(After a brief examination of the board, Martin moves one of his pieces. The game continues at a quick but casual pace throughout the conversation)

Martin: And how about you, good doctor? What works of unmitigated brilliance are hatching in your laboratories of late?

Tombe: Does it matter, really? They’re all just ideas, right? —Abstracts on ink and paper. You do more for the world by feeding those birds every day than I’ve ever done.

Martin: A heresy, my good doctor! A heresy! We both would do well not to forget the awesome power of ideas, lest we fall prey to their baser desires.

Tombe: I don’t know…Sometimes I think that the history of the world is just the history of men with pointy things, and that the ideas come after the fact.

Martin: Then perhaps you aren’t as wise as I once suspected. For surely a learned individual would know it is the man who exerts his will on the ‘pointy thing’ and not vice versa. And what a curious being, man, in that his will must be fed by ideas as surely as his belly is fed by bread and wine.

Tombe: So you hold that ideas are devices of the will?

Martin: A Fortiori, my good doctor. Idea is the will. And will is the idea.

Tombe: (Wryly) you’re sounding more and more like a philosopher every day.

Martin: Ah, yes, the philosopher! The thought peddler! The idea tycoon! The willer of the starving masses! For if the wills are to have their bread, there must be a baker! And if the wills are to drink their wine, there must be an orchard!

Tombe: Now you speak in metaphors?

Martin: It takes no metaphor to say of history that people would sooner let their bellies starve than their wills!
Tombe: Maybe once I would have agreed with you without question, Martin. But now I’m not so sure. A lot of people in my profession would say that the will is of the mind, and that the mind is just one small contingency of the physical brain, the organic matter, the ten-to-the-eleventh neurons. And if that’s the case—if the body is prior to the mind—then all of our pretty ideas, all of our theoretical pretensions about the world, will always be accidents of our instincts, of evolution.

Martin: Evolution! What a delectable idea it was that Mr. Darwin had. And how very palatable to so many wills, natural and social, sweet and savory! Yes, he was quite the intellectual entrepreneur. Rivaled only by Herr Marx and Herr Hitler as an arbiter of conceptual consumption!

Tombe: Martin, I admit that it has been years since science and philosophy have purported to deal in irrefutable, absolute, objective facts. But certainly you have to grant that evolution is more than just a convenient ideological tool of the will.

Martin: I’ll grant you more than that, my good doctor. For surely I wouldn’t deign question the wisdom of the right, honorable Mr. Darwin! No, by all accounts, the Descent of Man stands as an unassailable, incontrovertible and supreme Truth! But I ask you this, my friend and pedagogue: does the scrumptiousness of evolution—as you say, its ‘ideological convenience’—suffer from its own veracity? I submit to you that it does not. Nor more than Nazism’s patent falsity stole from its bittersweet pungency to so many German wills. No, good doctor, an idea’s truthfulness and its tastiness are incidental at best, and mutually exclusive at worst.

Tombe: If you’re right…is there any way to avoid those false but appealing ideas?

Martin: Unwholesome ideas? Fattening ideas? Poisonous ideas?

Tombe: Yes.

Martin: Once the will has tasted something it likes, regardless of its dietary value, it rarely ceases consuming until it has had its fill. Thus it is up to men such as yourself, the bakers as it were, to hold your recipes secret should you find them malnourishing.

(With this, Martin makes a forceful move on the chessboard, which he seems proud of)

Tombe: Don’t get your hopes up, Martin. You can stick with your Sicilian Defense, but I won’t fall for your Poison Pawn…. You’ve left too many gaps to cover and soon I’ll make a gambit you won’t counter. Checkmate is sixteen moves away. I can see it as clearly as if I were playing both sides of the board.

Martin: (Tipping his King over on the board) Well, my good doctor. It seems the day is yours.

(Lights fade).




SCENE V

Early Evening—Tombe’s Office. Tombe is standing in front of his desk, wearing black suit pants, shined black shoes, and a white tuxedo shirt. As the scene progresses, he tucks in his shirt, fastens his cuff links, and ties his bowtie.

Tombe: I’ll just sit it out a while, that’s all. I’ll study it, pick it apart, and subject it to every test of consistency I can think of. Then I’ll tweak it, reformulate it, polish it…Maybe I’ll send an abstract to a few folks in the department, and a few at NYU or Rutgers…Ned maybe, and Jerry…good people, smart people. If I’ve missed something, they’ll spot it. Then…when it’s ready, if its ready, I’ll publish it. It’s an idea, that’s all. And maybe it’s a powerful idea. Maybe it’s revolutionary. Maybe it will change the world, the universe. But right now it’s still my idea. And I can decide whether the universe is ready for it.

(There is a knock)

Tombe: Come in.

(David enters through the door stage left. He is wearing a collared t-shirt and khakis.)

Tombe: David. Where’s your tux? The banquet’s in less than an hour.

David: I’m not going to the banquet.

Tombe: David. I don’t want to go either. These things are utterly pointless, I know. But there are going to be trustees there. It could mean grant money for you.

David: No, you don’t understand—

Tombe: It’s work, isn’t it? The Kant lectures. 18th Century German is a little dense. Just put that part of your dissertation off, I’ll see if I can arrange a refresher course with someone here in the German department, then—

David: I’m withdrawing from the program, doctor.

Tombe: What??

David: I’m leaving the university.

Tombe: Why??? Where—when did this happen?

David: It’s been building up for a long time now.

Tombe: David…you’re one of the brightest pre-doc philosopher in the country, and besides that, you’re a friend and a colleague. Think about what you’re saying. What about all your talk of bringing ethics beyond postmodernism, redrawing the boundaries of reason? What about all of that?

David: If there’s one thing that seven years of philosophy has taught me, it’s that the boundaries of reason are immutable and unforgiving. Reason doesn’t work, doctor. It was arrogance to ever think that it did. Mankind can do better than reason, move past it…But I don’t think that philosophy can. You know that I think you do remarkable work, honorable work. But it’s so far removed from the real…I started out interested in politics, doctor. And when I got curious about the forces at work within politics, I read history and political science. And when I wanted still more fundamental principles, I read sociology and psychology. And then I turned to philosophy, and I thought it would finally deliver the tools of a perfected knowledge, all the promises of the Enlightenment. It took me seven years to realize that it can’t possibly do that. Philosophy is too bound by its own narrow commitments. There is nothing Meta about metaphysics… I know now that the answer to the problems of the world isn’t to climb farther up the ladder of abstraction…It’s to climb down and get your hands dirty.

Tombe: David…for God’s sake, doubting, questioning, searching, these are what make philosophy what it is. My freshman logic students could tell you that. All of these objections to reason, these post-whatever discourses, they’re in vogue now, it’s true. And I know that at some levels, they are valid and they make sense. But that can’t be the end, David. It’s a dialectic, it’s a pendulum.

David: Maybe, doctor. I hope you’re right. But my time is too short and my resources are too finite to wait around for one intellectual fad to replace another. I’m going to go somewhere, do something meaningful. The UN, the Peace Corps. I don’t know. Something. Anyway, I just came to thank you, and to say goodbye.

(He turns to leave. Tombe takes some pieces of paper from his desk.)

Tombe: Wait, David. Just do me one favor…(uncertainly) These are, these are some working notes for a theorem I’ve been toying with. Take them back to your apartment, read them over. Check them for flaws. If you still think reason is finite once you’ve read that…then I wish you Godspeed with whatever you decide to do.

(David reluctantly takes the papers and leaves. Lights fade.)




SCENE VI

Later that evening—a dimly lit banquet hall. Classical music is playing softly and there is the low murmur of background conversation. Kripke and Rebecca Swanson stand together at stage center, both dressed formally, holding champagne glasses and exchanging pleasantries. Tombe enters stage right and approaches.

Kripke: Ah, wonderful. This is the gentlemen I mentioned to you—Dr. Adam Tombe, soon to be chair of the philosophy department, meet Mrs. Rebecca Swanson, soon to be chair of the Board of Trustees.

Tombe: It’s a pleasure to meet you, ma’am.

Swanson: And you, doctor. Saul has talked about you endlessly.

Kripke: I was just telling Mrs. Swanson that you were the youngest person to win the Schock Prize in Philosophy and Logic. (To Swanson) His extensions of Gödel’s Incompleteness Theorem and the Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle have created quite a buzz in the field.

Swanson: You don’t have to convince me of the man’s qualifications, Saul. We hired him, didn’t we? Besides, I do know a thing or two about the subject. (To Tombe) I’ve read that your theories have been used to formally show that God’s existence can’t be determined one way or another.

Tombe: That is one of the more interesting applications I have seen, yes.

Swanson: I’ve also read that they’ve been rejected by Theists and Atheists alike.

Tombe: Sort of proves the point, doesn’t it?

Swanson: (laughs haughtily)…Tombe, that’s an interesting name. French, isn’t it?

Tombe: The name is. But through the vagaries of conquest, emigration, and marriage, I am not.

Swanson: If I remember my French from finishing school, tombé means ‘fallen’.

Kripke: That’s right.

Swanson: So that would make your Adam Fallen. How…fateful.

Tombe: I suppose so.

(Awkward silence. Sensing this, Kripke chimes in)

Kripke: Could I get either of you a drink?

Swanson: I’m fine thank you.

Tombe: I’ll have Bourbon with a twist of lemon, if you don’t mind.

(The very moment Kripke leaves, a waiter appears with a drink and an envelope)

Waiter: Here you are, sir: Bourbon with lemon. And this is also for you.

(Tombe accepts both, looking perplexed. Just then there is the sound of a phone ringing)

Swanson: Pardon me gentlemen, technology calls.

(Swanson produces a cell phone and begins a muted conversation. Slowly, a look of shock comes to her face. Meanwhile, Tombe opens the letter and reads the contents aloud to himself.)

Tombe: “Doctor—I can find no fault in your proof. Goodbye.”

(Putting away her phone, Swanson turns to Tombe with a look of shock and concern.)

Swanson: If you’ll excuse me, Dr. Tombe…it seems that someone has jumped from the chapel tower.

(Lights fade)



SCENE VI

Early next morning—Tombe’s office. Tombe sits at his desk, still wearing his tuxedo, though the bowtie is undone, the shirt only half tucked, and the cufflinks unfastened. He has a dazed, sad look on his face.

Tombe: I was disappointed in David for not having enough faith in reason…but he had enough faith to see what the Proof really meant, to see what it might…would lead to. And seeing that, knowing that…he took his own life…his own life which was worth mine a dozen times over… poor, poor wise old David…Last night I wanted nothing more than to do the absolute irrational act of curling into a ball and weeping like a baby. When I remembered the girl…Eva…I found myself wishing for an instant that she’d drop off the face of the earth so I wouldn’t have to deal with another human being… I went to the Registrar’s office this morning and ask for the contact information of an senior named Eva Rippen. I wanted to call and apologize for missing our meeting. The young man at the desk informed me that there wasn’t anyone of that name registered at Princeton University, and that the only other student named Eva was an art major studying in Paris for the semester…I went to the coffee shop where I was supposed to meet her, and the owner told me that he didn’t recall anybody of such and such a description coming in the night before…And then it all made sense, in a nonsensical way…The cigarettes, the chess game, the bourbon with lemon…and the girl who was Eva Rippen…

(He stands and looks at the bust of Socrates)

Tombe: Socrates was famous for saying “I know that I don’t know”…but I’m not even sure of that anymore. The only thing I know is the proof…what it can do…and the one thing it can’t…

Tombe: I find myself hoping, maybe praying, that the postmodernists and the ancients have got it right. That the human subject is fragmented and crippled, and that reality is beyond our feeble faculties…that we’re nothing but cuckoo birds popping out and chirping when the gears click into place, and ever after slinking back into the dark ignorance from whence we came.

(He picks up a wrinkled piece of paper from his desk and studies it once again)

Tombe: I had a moment of doubt, like David did, when I was just starting my doctorate at Oxford. I thought about the preposterousness of any field that aimed at figuring out first causes, at figuring out the nature of the self and of the universe. Because none of it is necessary to eat, sleep, seek shelter from the elements, and avoid predators. This idea of “self-consciousness” is nothing but an evolutionary surplus. Philosophy itself is nothing but an artifact of being on the top of the food chain for too long. What an arrogance it is to assume that existence hinges on puny human thoughts…that man is master of reality…They talked about great MINDS, biologists, physicists, economists, mathematicians…all the brilliance in the contents of their MINDS…inscribed on wood pulp and shelved all over the world. Millions and billions and trillions and quadrillions of pieces of MIND…They never stopped to think that BRAIN is prior to mind. Mind is brain’s masturbation. Mind is the leftovers, the flab over the muscle of instinct…The body…the MEAT of man…would exist whether or not its synapses couple in such a way that its lungs and larynx and tongue can manufacture a doubt.

(Pause)

Tombe: I’d like that, actually. If that were true, then maybe I could relax, quit my job, burn my books and live on an island somewhere. But here I am. Cogito ergo sum. And if it weren’t for me, for this MIND…then David would still be alive and Eva Rippen would still BE…

(Pause)

So all that is left is this (Holds up paper)…Seven simple propositions…Seven steps to oblivion. And it is inevitable.

(Tombe exits through the door to stage center, the same lecture hall as the previous day. He walks toward the lecturn, picks up a piece of chalk and turns to the class)

Tombe: We’ll be working on something new today…a proof…(turns and begins writing on the board)…Let us assume that through reason…

(Voice quiets as lights fade)