The Plays
A Happy Life
by C H A R L E S L . M E E
Music.
A chair and a divan are on stage.
Two men and two women enter dancing.
Three of them wear normal street clothes
and one of them wears the costume of a classical ballerina.
Of the three who wear normal street clothes,
the woman has one of the men on a dog leash,
and the other man is wearing a crimson prom dress.
They dance and dance,
and then, finally,
they sit, the couple together, in the chair,
and the solo man lies down (exhausted) on the divan.
The ballerina stands uncertainly to one side.
The therapist enters.
THE THERAPIST
Hello.
Can I help you?
THE WOMAN HOLDING THE LEASH
My husband has a pony tail
Kind of ragged and messy
And I don’t know if he thinks
He is a hippie
Or a beatnik......
And my friends wonder
Why I married him
And I don’t know why
I wish I had a brownstone in the West Village
And I think I need some help with that.
THE MAN ON THE LEASH
I worry about the stock market
....global warming
The war
What war
What war is going on now?
That’s the one I worry about
Plus my own impulses for greed and dishonesty
THE MAN IN THE CRIMSON DRESS
I have a book store
Used books
And antiques
And used dolls
And used necklaces
Paper flowers
A high chair
All for sale
And I have a fear of the economy
THE BALLERINA
I like to dance.
I wish I could just dance.
That’s all.
THE THERAPIST
I see.
[speaking to the ballerina]
I understand.
[to the others]
I’m afraid I think
there’s nothing I can do to help you.
You know, I’m a therapist.
But
I’m sorry.
I just don’t think I can help you.
I think you ought to look somewhere else.
THE MAN IN THE CRIMSON DRESS
Oh.
THE THERAPIST
I do apologize.
I think really you should be on your way.
[the three of them gather themselves up,
looking very forlorn and wilted
and turn and walk out
—and the therapist speaks to the ballerina]
I’m glad you can stay.
[Music.
a guy dances in
with a piece of pottery on his head like a hat
a woman dances in on her hands and knees
with a glass coffee table on her back
at some point, the guy sets a coffee mug down on her table
and a naked artist’s model dances in
in a skin tight “naked” flesh colored body suit
with the genitals painted on the fabric with black paint
when the music ends,
all three of the newcomers
stand
facing the therapist
in silence.
they look at one another
as though expecting one of them will take the initiative
and so, finally, the naked model speaks:]
THE MODEL
So Yeah.
I live in NY now.
My apartment is pretty sweet.
We’re right behind Lincoln Center,
and it sounds dumb but I feel rejuvenated
every time I walk through it.
I get the feeling like “this is why I’m here.”
I wish I knew more people here.
I kinda feel like this nobody in a sea of nobodies,
which has never really happened to me before.
It’ll change soon. I hope.
SO life is ok.
It’s a bit scary, but life is ok.
Stuff is a happenin.
Which is a good thing. I hope!
I had this WEIRD ASS nightmare last night.
I was in a parking lot
coming out of an event or a concert of some sort
and these evil cat people came in a black van
and got out and wreaked havoc on the place
blowing things up and killing people with their claws
and I got away in a backseat of someone’s car,
and for some reason I was taken to my friend Kim’s house,
but it wasn’t where Kim really lives,
it was my house,
but Kim lived there in my dream,
and I was telling her about the killer cat people
and she thought I was crazy,
and then I was in the backyard
and I saw the black van pull up front
and these 20 somethings got out,
but I realized that they were actually
the cat people disguised to not look cattish
and be completely human,
and I tried to make myself not seen
and walked to the neighbor’s backyard
and somehow I wound up hiding in their bathroom
only for the door to be busted in by the cat people
and my friend Kim,
who I was alerted to was a cat person as well.
And then I woke up
and I thought:
What does this all mean?
[once again the three newcomers all look around
at each other
expecting someone else to say something,
and, finally,
the glass table dancer speaks:
THE GLASS TABLE DANCER
I look at nature
I think:
did god have any taste at all?
The shapes are grotesque
The colors are garish
The smells are horrid
And your feet are always wet
you do have
the sun-blown rose
the morning dew
meteors in the night sky
but back in civilization you would have
plum cake
thick cream
scones and butter
hot cocoa
silk garters
whereas here what you have is
pebbles
moss
hail
the sighing of the night wind
the scent of the violet
bird’s nests from China
an orange gathered from the tree that grew over Zebulon’s Tomb
And back in civilization again you have
handkerchiefs of lawn,
cambric,
of Irish linen, of Chinese silk
initialed handkerchiefs
embroidered with satin stitch
trimmed with lace
hemstitched
necklaces and rings and nose jewels
a tweezer case, with twelve sets of tweezers,
one for each hour of the day
an ostrich egg, incised with a picture of the Coronation
the complete head and body of Father Crispin
buried long ago in the Vault of the Cordeliers at Toulouse;
a stone taken from a vulture’s head;
a large ostrich egg on which is inscribed the famous battle of Alcazar
a toothpick case
an eyebrow brush
a pair of French scissors
a quart of orange flower water
a quill pen
a red umbrella
Still, if you prefer nature,
of course,
that’s lovely.
You can have it.
THE POTTERY GUY
It’s not entirely clear to me
what I’m doing here.
As it started out
what I thought was
it was a perfectly straightforward life plan
as clear as the plot of a novel
I was setting out in life
to find a woman I could love
and who loved me
and then one thing led to another
I found myself with a friend
the next thing I knew I was at a chateau in the country
where there were many people
there was a party
I couldn’t find the woman I had come with
you know
I became disoriented.
But as I think about it
I think
is this not how life is?
You think you are doing one thing
it turns out you have been doing something else entirely
life has no plot
you only think it does
while all the time something without a plot is happening to you
over and over until you reach the end of your life
and you think you’ve had a beginning and a middle and an end
but all you’ve had is a start and a stop
and a lot of disorientation in between
trying to get a grip
hoping for true love
maybe you have a chance and you lose it
you don’t know where it went
you’re not sure if you had it
or who it was with
maybe the time you least thought it was meaningful at all
that was your one chance
you walked right past it
while you were pursuing another woman
and then you kick the bucket....
THE THERAPIST
Right.
I listen to what you say
You talk quite a bit,
each of you,
and yet
I have an odd feeling
that I really don’t understand
who anyone is.
THE MODEL
I like to dance.
But I would like to be able to sing and dance
at the same time.
THE GLASS TABLE DANCER
I am a sculptor,
but I want to make sculpture that speaks.
THE POTTERY GUY
I make pottery that I wear on my head
but I feel somehow
that’s obvious
and it isn’t enough.
THE THERAPIST
Ah.
I understand.
You are complete human beings
with complexity and depth
subtlety
multiple aspects
that we can see in your art
if not in your conversation.
I think I can help you all.
If you’ll just make yourselves at home?
[and so two of them squish together on the chair,
and one stretches out on the divan
Sudden music.
and
a guy dances in,
burned to charcoal from head to foot,
barely able to dance,
slips to the ground
writhes
and, after he has writhed for a while
the music stops and he speaks
THE WRITHING GUY
I had a friend,
a psychologist,
who did an experiment on rats when he was a student in the university,
and when he finished his experiment,
he was faced with the problem
of what to do with the rats.
He asked his advisor,
and his advisor said:
“Sacrifice them.”
My friend said: “How?”
And his advisor said:
“Like this.”
And his advisor took hold of a rat
and bashed its head against the side of a workbench.
My friend felt sick,
and asked his advisor how he could do that—
even though, in fact, as my friend knew,
this was not exactly a cruel way to kill a rat,
since instant death is caused
by cervical dislocation.
And his advisor said to him:
“What’s the matter?
Maybe you’re not
cut out to be a psychologist.”
How would you kill a rat?
I don’t know.
If you had to.
Hanging by the wrists,
burning with cigarettes
burning with an iron
hosing with water
hitting with fists
kicking with boots
hitting with truncheons
hitting with whips
exposing to cold showers
depriving of sleep
depriving of toilets
depriving of food
subjecting to abuse
beating with fists and clubs
hitting the genitals
hitting the head against the wall
electric shocks used on the head
on the genitals
on the feet
on the lips
on the eyes
on the genitals
hitting with fists
whipping with cables
strapping to crosses
caning on the backside
caning on the limbs
inserting sticks
inserting heated skewers
inserting bottle necks
pouring on boiling water
injecting with haloperidol
chlorpromazine
trifluoperazine
beating on the skull
cutting off the fingers
submerging in water
breaking of limbs
smashing of jaws
crushing of feet
breaking of teeth
cutting the face
removing the finger nails
wrapping in plastic
closing in a box
castrating
multiple cutting
[Sudden Music again
and a woman dances in solo
in an elegant black dress
with a blood red face
does a wild wild dance
and smears red lipstick all over her face
and then throws herself to the ground on her back over and over and over
she becomes covered with dust
as she kicks and writhes wildly on the ground on her back
like a cockroach frantic on its back
and after the music stops, she stops moving
and speaks]
THE BLOOD RED WOMAN
Men.
Who wants you?
With a man, every act of love is an act of rape.
A man will swim through a river of snot,
wade nostril-deep through a mile of vomit,
if he thinks there’ll be a friendly pussy waiting for him on the other side.
He’ll screw a woman he despises,
any snaggle-toothed hag,
and furthermore, pay for the opportunity.
A man will fuck mud if he has to.
And why is that?
Because every man, deep down,
knows he is a worthless piece of shit
hoping some woman will make him feel good about himself.
Eaten up with guilt, shame, fears and insecurities
obsessed with screwing,
to call a man an animal is to flatter him;
a man is a walking dildo,
a completely isolated unit,
trapped inside himself,
incapable of love, friendship, affection or tenderness
his responses entirely visceral, never cerebral
his intelligence a mere tool of his drives and needs;
a half-dead, unresponsive lump of flesh,
trapped in a twilight zone halfway between humans and apes.
Why did god create man?
Because a vibrator can’t mow the lawn.
You know what they say:
What do you call a man with half a brain?
Gifted.
Why do men name their penises?
Because they want to be on a first-name basis
with the person who makes all their decisions.
What do you call the useless bit of fatty tissue
at the end of a penis?
A man.
THE THERAPIST
I understand.
And
how can I help you?
THE WRITHING GUY
I am a painter.
And I want my paintings to dance.
THE BLOOD RED WOMAN
I am an opera singer,
but I just want to sing Broadway show tunes.
THE THERAPIST
I can help you both.
No problem.
THE WRITHING GUY
Like,
for example,
what would you do?
THE THERAPIST
You want your paintings to dance.
Then what you need to do
is take off your clothes
and paint yourself
—including your face!—
and then your paintings can move.
THE WRITHING GUY
Wow.
THE GLASS TABLE DANCER
That was easy.
But how do you get sculpture to speak?
THE THERAPIST
You make installation art.
It can speak.
It can have conversations with itself.
It can have a conversation with a visitor.
You know,
really,
the point is
you need to do what you love.
What do I do?
I am a therapist.
I choose those I believe I can help.
I choose my favorite thoughts and fantasies and visions
to live with me forever,
and I reject those who don’t turn me on.
And people pay me to do this.
You think of me as a therapist.
I am like a theatre director.
I put on the show I want to see.
I stage my own life
with myself at the center of what I love
Isn’t this the story, really,
of everyone’s life?
Isn’t this what we all do?
We fill our personal fantasy stage with those we love
those who are cool and wild and wonderful.
This is the psychosis we all have.
Everyone makes art.
Everyone is an artist
making themselves out of the materials
at hand that they were given at birth
and that they have been given since then
by the world
and then they make of that what they want to make
and what they want to be.
And then,
if you’ve got a lot of money
you can do it on Broadway.
And if you don’t have a lot of money
you can do it at the Brick Theatre in Williamsburg,
in Brooklyn.
Or if you don’t have any money at all
you can do it for free
in that park in Carroll Gardens in Brooklyn.
Wherever you do it
that’s your life
that’s your work of art
that’s what you’ve made out of what you were given to start with
and what you did with it.
And you did what you loved.
And since you’re the world’s leading expert
on what you love
you can’t be wrong.
We are all artists.
We are all directors
putting together a show.
Try not to forget to have a good time
no matter what else you might be struggling with.
THE BALLERINA
We do what we love.
THE POTTERY GUY
Or what breaks our heart.
THE BLOOD RED WOMAN
Or what we hate.
THE THERAPIST
And my job
is to work with you
and try to help you
to do what you love.
THE MODEL
How can I dance and sing at the same time?
THE THERAPIST
[How to Sing and Dance at the Same Time
http://www.wikihow.com/Sing-and-Dance-at-the-Same-Time]
THE POTTERY GUY
And what should I do?
THE THERAPIST
[Popular items for wearable pottery
https://www.etsy.com/market/wearable_pottery]
THE BLOOD RED WOMAN
What can I do?
THE THERAPIST
[How to Raise Your Child As a Great Singer
http://www.wikihow.com/Raise-Your-Child-As-a-Great-Singer]
[Sing Better Than Ever: 6 Tips to Improve Your Present Singing Voice
http://vocalcoach.hubpages.com/hub/6-Tips-to-Better-Singing]
[Now
suddenly,
we hear a violin offstage
and, after a bit,
the violin is joined by an orchestra,
and the violinist—who is a total street derelict—
dances in
and, after a bit,
he plays his violin again,
and then,
when the music stops,
he turns with his violin,
open a bottom dresser drawer,
puts the violin into the drawer
and then steps into the drawer
and smashes and smashes and smashes his violin
with his stomping foot—
and we can hear the wood shattering.
He stops,
closes the drawer,
and looks around at everyone.
Silence.
He turns back to the dresser,
opens the drawer,
takes out his violin,
plays it,
stops,
puts the violin back in the drawer,
stomps it—
and, again, we can hear the wood shattering—
closes the drawer,
looks around at everyone.
Silence.
He turns back to the dresser,
opens the drawer,
takes out his violin.
THE THERAPIST
Now, then.
Come with me.
[he puts his arm around the violinist,
takes the violin from him,
escorts him to the divan,
lays him down,
and then gives the violin back to the violinist]
Now, then,
take your violin in your arms,
lie with it here
make love with it
very gently
very quietly
just embracing it, that’s all,
and then the two of you
will feel better and make up.
Right?
THE VIOLINIST
I think so.
Yes.
THE THERAPIST [patting the violinist]
Good.
THE VIOLINIST
And if we don’t?
THE THERAPIST
Then you will take the violin
and I will give you some glue
and you will glue the pieces to the wall
and that will be a sculpture.
So that’s all.
It could be you would rather be a sculptor.
And you simply need to learn
to do what you love.
THE VIOLINIST
Thank you.
THE THERAPIST
And you will stay with us,
and, together,
we will take care of one another.
THE VIOLINIST
Thank you.
BLOOD RED WOMAN
Maybe I should be a poet?
You see a woman when she is grown up
you see how she has turned out
and you think then you could say, oh, right
this was inevitable
the way she grew up
you could tell how she would turn out
this is the person she would be
because Freud bla bla bla
and the social dynamics
her background bla bla
But really
how a human will turn out
they just turn out how they do
and then, later on, maybe they change their minds
and they turn out another way
and then they turn out another way yet again
This guy said to me one time
I can’t pin you down
like a butterfly, you mean?
I don’t know he said
well, I said,
I don’t think I want to be pinned down.
[She ends,
looks around at everyone.
Silence.]
THE THERAPIST
OK, here.
I have something for you.
[he hands her a few pieces of paper]
BLOOD RED WOMAN
What’s this?
THE THERAPIST
This is the sheet music for a Broadway song.
BLOOD RED WOMAN
Oh.
[Music.
She sings.
And, while she sings,
lots more patients enter—
as many patients as the production budget allows:
for example:
a solo dancer in a red dress enters;
she holds a portable computer in one hand,
with ear pieces in her ears;
and we hear the music she hears
and:
a headless accordion player enters,
and plays along with the music
[that is, his jacket and shirt and tie cover his head]
and:
a man dances in with a woman
and throws himself repeatedly to the floor
and finally she does, too
until they are both exhausted
and just lying there
and:
an old guy slumped in a wheelchair
accompanied by an old woman in a wonder woman costume with a walker
and:
a guy walks through with a lamb at the end of a rope
and:
Niki de Saint Phalle monsters
with big plaster heads
with open mouths and big round eyes
painted bright blue and crimson red
and:
A guy brings in a big wooden box.
He sets it carefully in the center of the room,
turns, opens the bag he has taken out of the box,
reaches into the bag and takes out a bottle he has decorated.
He throws the decorated bottle into the wooden box,
and we hear it shatter.
He smiles,
takes another decorated bottle, throws it into the box,
and we hear it shatter,
takes another decorated bottle, throws it into the box,
and we hear it shatter,
takes another decorated bottle, throws it into the box,
and we hear it shatter,
Then, smiling,
he climbs up on the box,
and stands on his head,
with his head down in the box
as the music plays.
And after a while,
he slowly
stands on his feet next to the box,
and we see his head is covered in blood.
And, finally,
the blood red woman comes to the end of her song.
And everyone turns
and applauds her.
And she smiles and looks shy and happy.
THE BALLERINA
I wish I could sing
No
Yes
You can’t make a living singing
So what should I do?
Be a rock collector?
THE WRITHING GUY
Better than singing
THE POTTERY GUY
Or a waiter
THE MODEL
I’ve done waiting
THE VIOLINIST
I’m still waiting
THE MODEL
For the beautiful weather
THE POTTERY GUY
Or a cold drink
THE GLASS TABLE DANCER
I’d just like to live in the country
A lawn to lie down on
Enough money, no worries
Not to feel anxious
THE BALLERINA
Relax and be at peace
THE POTTERY GUY
All leisure time
And relish life every day
THE WRITHING GUY
I’d rather live in the city
THE VIOLINIST
I never get tired of it
THE MODEL
Sometimes I almost start to cry,
thinking how one day I will die,
and how I will miss seeing the people on the sidewalk
the delivery men
the motorcycle riders
THE GLASS TABLE DANCER
people with their shopping carts
THE BALLERINA
the Chinese dancers in sunset park
THE GLASS TABLE DANCER
All the people
THE BALLERINA
Sitting in a cafe and seeing them
Their haircuts
Their shoes
their pants
their legs
THE WRITHING GUY
Hairdos
Tattoos
THE POTTERY GUY
All the women walking by on the street
THE GLASS TABLE DANCER
I’d just like the right pair of shoes
THE WRITHING GUY
The right socks
THE POTTERY GUY
A comfortable shirt
THE GLASS TABLE DANCER
I don’t mention underwear
THE BALLERINA
I worry about my toes
THE MODEL
I worry about my feet
THE GLASS TABLE DANCER
I worry about the living room rug
THE MODEL
I worry about my mother
THE BALLERINA
I think right here.
This is the perfect place for a wedding
I mean
THE WRITHING GUY
if you’re going to get married at all
THE GLASS TABLE DANCER
although, for the life of me
I don’t see why anyone ever does any more.
THE POTTERY GUY
What could be the point?
Oh, right,
love,
right.
THE WRITHING GUY
Because you can’t love someone unless you marry them.
THE MODEL
And commitment.
THE BALLERINA
Right.
THE POTTERY GUY
Why not just a handshake then
and say, OK, it’s a deal?
THE WRITHING GUY
Why make a thing out of it with a crowd of people
you wish you never had to even talk to?
THE BALLERINA
It’s not as though I don’t know
that everyone thinks marriage is an old fashioned
sort of thing
and pointless
THE MODEL
and people have priests and rabbis get up at a wedding
and say all sorts of things
that no one believes any more
so that a bride and groom start out in life
with their whole marriage,
the whole center of their lives from then on,
based on things they think are a total lie
THE GLASS TABLE DANCER
so that
how can they expect to stay together
if they’ve been such total hypocrites
at what they believe is the most solemn
beginning moment of their lives
THE WRITHING GUY
and so or else
they try to write their own vows
and they end up saying all these things
about growing together
and respecting one another
and letting one another’s
trees be free to grow
THE VIOLINIST
and they never say till death do us part any more
so it seems they’re not promising
much of anything to anyone these days
THE BLOOD RED WOMAN
One time I was offered to my masters
I was going to be whipped in that humiliating position—
arms and legs spread—
and I was perspiring
my body was taut with the pain
but pain turning into pleasure
and then when I was suspended by the handcuffs
and I felt the pain in my thighs
my thighs were trembling
There was a time I thought after the first time
never again
OK
never again.
What you have done once is not your fate
not something you have to do over and over again
and so you say
never again
THE BALLERINA
but then you do it again
THE MODEL
A human being can be thought of as a tree trunk on fire
You can lay them down screaming
on their stomachs or their backs—
or you can spare the fire
and lay them out on the beach
nothing more than breathless lacerations
shapeless silhouettes
half eaten
getting up or moaning on the ground
then you might say
the head—
the eyes, the ears, the brain
represent the complications of the buccal orifice
THE BALLERINA
the penis, the testicles
or you could say
the female organs that correspond to these
are the complications of the anal orifice.
THE MODEL
So you have the familiar violent thrusts
that come from the interior of the body
indifferently ejected
from one end of the body or the other
discharged,
that is to say,
wherever they meet the weakest resistance.
THE WRITHING GUY
The world is a bleeding wound
when it comes to that.
THE BALLERINA
The natural state of a man,
the ecstatic state, will find itself in the visions of things that appear suddenly:
cadavers, for example,
nudity, explosions, spilled blood, sunbursts, abscesses, thunder
THE MODEL
Everything that exists
destroys itself
when it comes to that.
The sun in the sky,
the stars,
consuming themselves
and dying.
The joy of life that comes into the world
to give itself
and be annihilated.
THE BALLERINA
I can imagine the earth projected in space
as it is
in reality
like a woman screaming,
her head in flames.
THE MODEL
Do you ever permit yourself simple pleasures?
THE BLOOD RED WOMAN
Sometimes.
THE WRITHING GUY
For example?
THE BLOOD RED WOMAN
Well.
What I like
I like
Vanilla or Chocolate any time?
Strawberry if you prefer or Butter Pecan?
Broccoli swirl ?
Almond Crunch?
Coffee?
Coffee Mocha Fudge?
Black Cow?
Beet fantasia?
Booger Banana?
Caramel Critters?
Cotton Candy?
Canned pea soufflé ?
Crunchy gravel ?
Dulce De Leche?
Earwax Appeal ?
Escargot Ecstasy?
Fresh mowed dandelion with grass clippings ?
Goo Goo Cluster?
Tofu custard?
Toad-drool ?
Termite Crumble ?
Orange Shitbert ?
Seymour’s Hickory Smoked Semen ?
Rocky Roadkill Micecream Supreme?
Vomit Comet Excrement ?
Hemp Hemp Hooray ?
Nitrous Oxide ?
Tempered Fiberglass
Pink Insulation Sensation
THE THERAPIST
I don’t know.
I hear you telling me all this
and I think
before you said anything
I thought I had a sense of who you are
and then
after you speak
I think now I understand less
I think it might be
the more I get to know you
the less I know you
because why?
because you have taken me deeper and deeper
into the mystery of who you are?
The human mystery.
You think you know who someone is
when you first meet them
And then after you get to know them
you realize you have no idea
Such is the mystery of being a human being
You are as unknown as the universe—
and as wonderful!
THE WRITHING GUY
As unknown as the universe….
[silence]
THE THERAPIST
I see now
what it is we need to do.
What we need
is a group therapy session.
of course
anyone watching us might think we’re crazy
doing what we do
but as my father used to say
de gustibus non est disputandum
it was the only Latin he knew
and he said it often
at the dinner table
and in the movies
at concerts and in the theatre
in museums and art galleries
de gustibus non est disputandum
there is no disputing taste
and you might even say—
as I always say,
and then I always say it again—
we are all artists
that is the truth of human beings
and the activity of human life
every man and woman is an artist
but what we make is not only a little work of art
but a whole big society
and, like the society we want to live in today
a global society
a society that includes everyone from everywhere doing everything
and we don’t criticize them
because not everyone is from Des Moines
some of us are from Brooklyn and Shanghai
and we are creating the world
we are god
well, modern god
well maybe modern techno bio geo ologists
and of course we may be creating the world
that includes atheists and theatre critics, too
but that’s ok
let them have their degustibus, too,
we don’t dispute it
they know what they love
and it might not be us
it may be they would just rather live in Minnesota
and not have to deal with all this complication
but I’ve made the world I want to live in
and really?
I love it
I love living here
This is my idea of
heaven on earth
you want to blame me
and criticize me
well, but this is what everyone does
I am everyman
and everywoman
this is human life
this is what we all do
but we are not all isolated individual artists
alone in their lofts
we are a society
a global society
a world
the planet earth!
Music.
And everyone performs like crazy.
So, now,
in the end,
we have
music
and dancing
and singing
and acrobatics
and martial arts
and violin playing
and film projected on the rear wall
and tv
and someone attaching sculpture pieces to a wall
and juggling
and painting
and installation art building
And the piece of installation art
that is still being built as the performance occurs
has moving parts
and it sings
the famous unh unh unh unh dada poem
and everyone joins in
EVERYONE:
UHNUHNUHNUHNUHNUHNUHNUHN
UHNUHNUHN
EEEEEEEEEEEE
POOH-POOHPOOH-POOHRRRA
slslsl
drrrrroomoom
UHNUHNUHNUHN
aaaaaaaaaatzeen
UEEEE EE EE EE EE
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA
rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
Rrumpfftilffto?
Bee bee bee bee bee
Zee zee zee zee zee
Pe pe pe pe pe
Pii pii pii pii pii
Poo poo poo poo poooo?
Grimm glimm gnimm bimbimm
Grimm glimm gnimm bimbimm
Grimm glimm gnimm bimbimm
[And the poem goes on and on.
Here is the whole text of the Kurt Schwitters poem “Ursonate”:
http://creativegames.org.uk/modules/Art_Technology/Dada/schwitters.htm
and:
the therapist himself dances in the midst of it all
even though we never knew he really wanted to be a dancer
(and a singer)
He takes off his shirt
puts on a Superman shirt
and then a superman cape
and then he looks at his pants
and he wonders how he can wear plain pants
with his shirt and cape
so he just takes off his pants
so he is in his undershorts
and then he paints his face
and puts a piece of pottery on his head
so now we see he is the craziest one of all
and then he joins in the dancing
spinning like crazy
as everyone continues
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
dancing
and singing
singing
singing
singing
singing
singing
singing
singing
singing
singing
and acrobatics
acrobatics
acrobatics
acrobatics
acrobatics
acrobatics
acrobatics
acrobatics
acrobatics
acrobatics
acrobatics
acrobatics
acrobatics
acrobatics
acrobatics
acrobatics
acrobatics
acrobatics
acrobatics
and martial arts
martial arts
martial arts
martial arts
martial arts
martial arts
martial arts
martial arts
martial arts
martial arts
and violin playing
violin playing
violin playing
violin playing
violin playing
violin playing
violin playing
violin playing
violin playing
and film projected on the rear wall
film projected on the rear wall
film projected on the rear wall
film projected on the rear wall
film projected on the rear wall
film projected on the rear wall
film projected on the rear wall
film projected on the rear wall
film projected on the rear wall
and tv
tv
tv
tv
tv
tv
tv
and someone attaching sculpture pieces to a wall
someone attaching sculpture pieces to a wall
someone attaching sculpture pieces to a wall
someone attaching sculpture pieces to a wall
someone attaching sculpture pieces to a wall
someone attaching sculpture pieces to a wall
someone attaching sculpture pieces to a wall
someone attaching sculpture pieces to a wall
and juggling
juggling
juggling
juggling
juggling
juggling
juggling
juggling
juggling
juggling
and painting
painting
painting
painting
painting
painting
painting
painting
painting
painting
painting
and installation art building
installation art building
installation art building
installation art building
installation art building
installation art building
installation art building
installation art building
installation art building
installation art building
installation art building
installation art building
installation art building
and singing
and acrobatics
and martial arts
and violin playing
and film projected on the rear wall
and tv
and someone attaching sculpture pieces to a wall
and juggling
and painting
and installation art building
and singing
and acrobatics
and martial arts
and violin playing
and film projected on the rear wall
and tv
and someone attaching sculpture pieces to a wall
and juggling
and painting
and installation art building
and singing
and acrobatics
and martial arts
and violin playing
and film projected on the rear wall
and tv
and someone attaching sculpture pieces to a wall
and juggling
and painting
and installation art building
The therapist lies down on the couch to relax,
and,
after a little bit,
the whole cast gathers around him
warmly, happily
with an enormous box of cookies.
And they all have cookies,
sitting happily in a semi-circle
around the therapist.
The End
Charles Mee's work has been made possible by the support of Richard B. Fisher and Jeanne Donovan Fisher.
