by Brett Rutherford
Nothing was right.
The promised theater
was nothing but a
drafty church, whose pews
a squirming, grumpy
audience assured.
when rising waters
tipped a truck over
and pillars, statues,
trees and all
were turned from
plaster to rubbish.
made to carry the
gods’ chariots
aloft, sank into a
hole that suddenly
swallowed a Brooklyn
warehouse.
or so they thought —
until the news came
of the all-day
standoff between police
and terrorists, at
the designer’s loft,
from Greenwich
Village as sirens wailed
and helicopters
circled overhead.
“No, sets, no props,
no lights,”
shall we go forward?
“Street clothes!”
one actor chimed.
“Naked!” said one.
“In underwear!”
another insisted.
Reluctantly they all
agreed to share
whatever items best
suited the characters
they played,
regardless of fit, like children
dressed from an attic
trunk of castaways.
The audience
assembled. The playwright,
afflicted with a
sudden itch from knee
to ankle, kept
scratching thereabouts
as he addressed the
audience. Just then
the words were
whispered in his ears
that two lead actors
had amnesia
out of nowhere and
not a word
could they speak
without a script.
“A staged reading,”
the playwright explained.
“You have all been
invited to an intimate,
once-in-a-lifetime,
behind-the-scenes
staged reading. Not
to be repeated!”
They stirred, they
grumbled, but they all
agreed, critics and
all, to suffer out
the play’s
performance. The actors
sat unmoving, except
for soliloquies,
where they did dance
about, and fall,
and rise again, as
though possessed,
and they pulled it
off – a triumph!
Still did the
playwright fuss and fidget.
The itching was
unbearable, till
in the shadow of the
back-of-stage
he lifted his
trousers and peeked —
at stiff green stems
and shiny leaves,
at sprouting yellow
and purple flowers
growing this way and
that from out
his living flesh. As
tough as wood,
they would not break,
nor would
the petals of the
flower loosen.
He nearly fainted.
The audience pressed
on every side, hands
grasping his.
“The greatest drama
ever!” a critic crowed.
“Shakespeare,
Euripides, and thee!” one cried.
The beaming lead
actors, their memories
now restored, fell to
his arms and wept.
“Tomorrow,” a wealthy
patron told him,
“we will order new
sets, costumes, and all.
A theater on Broadway
will be cleared for you.
This is the triumph
of the era!”
The actress, Claudia,
dear friend, he took aside,
and showed her the
botanic horror, whose host
upon his calves and
thighs had doubled.
“I need to see a
doctor at once” What can this be?”
“You took a lover
recently?” she asked.
He nodded. “He was
special, wasn’t he?”
He nodded. “Oh, not
some new disease, oh, no!”
Then Claudia took his
hand and continued:
“No, not a disease,
not really. Tell me of him.
Was he a lover
extraordinaire?” He nodded.
“A lover surpassing
all human lovers?”
Again he nodded. “Did
he inspire this play?”
“Again and again yes.
It was as though
his voice dictated
everything. I felt as though
I had been written
through, as though
I were seven feet
tall and made of steel.”
“Well, then, my dear,
you have been blessed
and blasted both. You
have been Zeus’s lover,
and you have birthed
a play with him.
All fine and good,
but now Queen Hera knows.”
“He said he had a
wife. I said it didn’t matter.
We were perfect
together. Perfect! now this?
What have I done to
merit some parasite
like mistletoe all
over my beautiful legs?” —
“This is his way of
saving you. You must have
read old Ovid’s
stories. You’ll be dead
in twenty-four hours,
transformed into
a beautiful shrub I
shall plant to honor you.”
At this the
playwright fainted, and the rest
remains at the
Botanical Gardens to see.
