Impossible Drama

ACT ONE:

lights up on a woman. she stares into the audience.
she gives birth.

- black out -

ACT TWO:

lights up on a boy sitting at a simple table with two glasses
of water pouring the water back and fourth. he does this until
the water spills into his hands or on the table
or until it has all evaporated.

- black out -

ACT THREE:

lights up revealing the stage is a huge glass of water. inside
the glass there appears to be nothing but water; but in
generations time the single-celled organisms will split
and evolved to be visible to the naked eye.

- black out -

ACT FOUR:

lights up on two young men sitting on either side of a simple table.
they pour the contents of empty water glasses back and fourth.
all they know how to do is stare at each other. the table grows
legs and leaves, their glasses slowly fill to the brim.

- black out -

ACT FIVE:

lights up on a blank stage. the audience's breath troubles the
red curtains in the wings until it appears the whole theatre
is breathing. the moisture from their breath condenses
on the scrim until it begins to drip. it's beautiful.

- black out -

ACT SIX:

lights up to show a black river. the river carries silt
then sediment, then boats, then bodies. so many bodies float
in the black river until there is almost no river left. the banks
of the river are coated in a deep red that grows.

- black out -

ACT SEVEN:

lights up on the second young man dressed in radio wires
and electricity, he climbs into a bath and the bath says,

bath: i am half full and still spilling over.

the bath says: i'm sorry

says: give me your cells and in a millennia i will make you again.

- black out -

ACT EIGHT:

lights up on a cemetery. only it's not a cemetery.
it's just a hole and it's raining and the rain fills the hole
and it has scared the mourners under their umbrellas
when some strange light rises up from the dark water.

- black out -

ACT NINE:

lights up on a man sitting alone with his water glasses.
the stage is filled with water glasses. the audience too,
beneath their seats or full inside of them. we drink, everyone
but the man drinks.

- black out -

ACT TEN:

lights up on stage. it's so bright
it's terrifying.

- black out -

sam sax is a 2015 NEA Fellow and a Fellow at The Michener Center for Writers where he's the associate poetry editor at Bat City Review. He's the two time Bay Area Unified Grand Slam Champion + author of the chapbooks, A Guide to Undressing Your Monsters (Button Poetry 2014) + sad boy / detective (Winner of the Black Lawrence's 2014 Black River Chapbook Prize). His poems are forthcoming in Boston Review, Indiana Review, Ninth Letter, Normal School, Rattle, Salt Hill + other journals.