Here is the first third of a play I wrote last year! Please let me know your thoughts!

CAST

SHARK ……………. Very sleek man with defined features, calm, sarcastic

POET ………………. Mid-20s, curious, unsure

GOD ………………. Woman, calm

TIME: Present

PLACE: Ocean

SETTING: Scene I – Under a tree

Scene II – The ocean

SCENE ONE

(Lights rise. POET is lying under a colorful tree. There is a backdrop of a bay with ships. He is holding a notebook and pen and gazing upward.)

POET: (pleasantly nostalgic) It takes fire to fly, she said. I told her that only ashes and leaves catch the smoke’s ascension and twisted confusion. I asked her what it takes to sink. Fire. She said fire. I said no, she said yes, I said yes, she said no. We laughed. I told her that I break down in areas of my house I keep my secrets in. She said secrets are our truths. I told her to tell me her secrets, her truths. She said she could not tell me her truth until I told her mine. She said I didn’t have to listen… but I knew I did. She made me want to create. She made me want to reach my face toward the face of God and kiss it! She made me want to be a better man. She… made me… (sigh) I kept her around because she planted the most absurd, dysfunctional, realistic thoughts in my head, pushing the tips of her soft fingers into my deepest veins. Planting seeds is easier than sowing the rain. The rain… the salty, crying skies. Mother Nature must be a poet reflecting all of her deepest wishes on me. (sigh) I must do the same. I am as powerful as her, am I not? (raising voice and becoming more confident) I am the rain, the earth, the seeds of knowledge! I am the poet, the adventurer, the eighth wonder of the world! (boat horn sounds) Oh! Time to show Mother Nature that I am a worthy son! (kisses tree)

(POET scrambles to feet and runs off stage.

Lights fade. Wave sounds ensue.)

BLACKOUT

END OF SCENE

SCENE TWO (Pt. 1)

(Sounds of men yelling, thunder crashing, and things breaking. There are flashing lights to represent lightning. A final crash abruptly ends with a harsh silence. Lights rise to dim. A mannequin representing POET descends.)

POET: (voice recording; recitative tone)

And I saw the flash of a white throat,

And a double row of white teeth,

And eyes of metallic grey,

Hard and narrow and slit.

(beat; normal tone) Pratt… I wonder if he had ever watched his own men be devoured by such a beast. The accuracy is alluring and insufficient. (beat) Pratt never wrote about the blood. The water’s nearly purple because of it. One left. They missed one man… The ocean is purple and the people eaters feast. They are not one eyed nor one horned, but they do fly. Such an effortless movement is the glide of a shark. But the shark is not the monster. The water is. (beat) I wish I could write this down.

(A mix of atonal/tonal music plays and intensifies to be scary and beautiful. SHARK’s shadow is projected
on a screen behind POET so that
the mannequin disturbs the shadow’s path.
As the music intensifies, POET begins
to wiggle around trying to follow
the shadow. The shadow disappears
and SHARK enters on stage.)

YOU MAY NOT HAVE AN IDEA OF WHAT IS GOING ON RIGHT NOW, BUT STAY TUNED AND GAIN CLARITY NEXT WEEK! TAP INTO YOUR PHILOSOPHICAL POET AND GUESS WHAT HAPPENS NEXT!