Easter Island by David van Belle Draft 4-- July, 2017 p. 1
EASTER ISLAND by David van Belle [email protected] 587-974-3538
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Draft 4—July 2017 Please note this is a work-in-progress. A production draft will be available after the show’s premiere in March, 2018.
The play is performed by one actor. In as much as it is possible, the performer should be from a community that is underrepresented on the stages that the play is performed on. She is costumed in street clothes (i.e. nothing specific to any of the characters or anything that would suggest a different time or place than the one in which the play is being staged). Characters should be distinct enough from each other so that the audience can follow the transitions from character to character easily.
Transitions should be carried out with fluidity. No blackouts between speeches or other interludes, except where indicated. Characters often change mid-sentence—one character finishes the previous character’s sentence.
NOWIKCX, male, mid-70s. A tattooist. He is gregarious, a born storyteller. His story sections should be active (i.e. not just told from sitting). The space breathes with Nowikcx, so we believe/understand his final transformation. Speech patterns as written are just suggestions—choose an accent and adapt accordingly, perhaps an accent that is familiar to the performer. Or do a fakey accent, maybe. Nowikcx talks directly to the audience at all times, making eye contact, as if each audience member has a one-on-one appointment with him. We have been invited into his space— ultimately it is Nowikcx who conjures the environment of the play.
VISH, female, 32. An artist. The sense of a second presence with her should develop over time as her body and mind deteriorate. Dialogue lines in italics with a “-“ in front of them (found later in the script) are heard in her mind, and not out loud. The words manifest as text in the space, however.
PATI, female, 45. An oil and gas prospector. She is contemporary, Albertan.
-- PART ONE
At the top of the show, Nowikcx is in the theatre. Perhaps he’s there in the centre of the performance space as the audience enters, meditating.
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NOWIKCX Welcome. Hello. Welcome welcome. Hi there. I am glad that you come to see me. It’s a very good choice, yes. Welcome welcome. There’s room for improv here, of course.
You, you come to me for help, everybody come here for help. You, you come here because… it is magical to come here. You are magical, in what you do.
You magic.
No, you not doing magic, no fucking wizard no ‘You! Shall! Not!—’ No. Stupid. You. You are thinking like magic. You need like magic. To help.
An you think I mean abracadabra hoobidyhoobidy homeopathicky all dat stuff—NO.
Ma-gic. You here for the past, the present, for the future.
I been at this for a long time, fifty, sixty year now. This the magic I do: you come in, you weak. I put tattoo on your skin, colour, image, then you strong.
You looking to change. You sad. You worried, I can tell, yeah! Is difficult to change! You dono how. You keep…
VISH …coming here to the first one, where it started.
She speaks as if she is documenting what she’s seeing to an outside listener:
Ah, this one, the first one, this artwork, it’s small. Really small, compared to the rest. One hectare only of scrub on the back section of Uncle Frank’s land…which is where we are right now. This was Uncle Frank’s ranch. You entered through the northwest corner, off the access road, which is grown over now, it’s almost impassable. I just barely managed to crawl through the brush. Over there is where the cars would park, all of them teetering on the edge of the creek, city people who aren’t used to parking without curbs, passengers getting out and then landing with their right feet among the dried out rushes and waving away clouds of crickets.
This is the point, here, of entry, through the mouth. This is where I am now. Lots of kudzu growing over, which is what I planned, although I didn’t realize it would be so… invasive, maybe is the word, it’s kind of everywhere. I didn’t think it would do so well this far north.
You can’t really tell what’s going to happen at this point here. It’s all hidden. It’s meant to be. When I brought the first few patrons in, at the opening, I led them all by hand, right through here.
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She begins her journey through. She walks slowly, painfully. We see for the first time that her body is in very bad shape. She is near death.
Down the causeway, this way, around three bends, through the living spruce buttresses until we turn the corner and everything opens up.
We’re going to walk this. I think when I sit down that’s where I’ll sit for the rest of my short rest of my short life. 32 is short, right?
By some standards.
When I sit, I’ll think I’ll never get up again. So I’m gonna walk it. Stumble it. And we’ll see if I can figure out…
Pati has just about had it.
PATI: …if I heard you correctly. What did you say to me?
No, don’t walk away. You stop. You stay here. You turn around or you’re fired, is that clear? As in leave the mountains, go back to the city, head directly to the office and clear out your fucking desk.
Say it again.
Come on, say it.
No?
I’m not gonna lie to you, fellas. I am an unhappy woman right now. Professionally speaking. You peckerheads are gonna be the ones who need to pick up the slack on this, ‘cause otherwise we’re screwed. I mean it, we’re just gonna be screwed unless we find a play that can make the math work.
Cheap, easy, oil glut math.
You. Jimmy Peckerhead. Head over to the top of that ridge and tell me what you see.
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I know that’s not your name. Whaddya think, I think your name is really Jimmy Peckerhead, that your mother Mrs. Peckerhead married Mr. Peckerhead and called you Jimmy? Made a bad choice, Mrs. Peckerhead. Do better.
We’ve been out here all day in the cold, I lost feeling in my fingertips about ninety four minutes ago, I got a blister on my heel the size of my enlarged left ovary, and I don’t like the look of those clouds to the west. And we still haven’t found anything promising. Why should I learn your real name.
I don’t care if you’ve been working with us for ‘eight months,’ Jimmy, get over to the top of that ridge and tell me what you see!
And you, Timmy Peckerhead. That’s right, you’re Jimmy’s brother. Get your nose off your phone and look at that god damned paper map and tell me where we are.
Uh huh.
Uh huh.
Well which side is it? North side or south side of the line?
You think we’re on the north side. Are you sure?
‘Kinda sure.’ Let me see the map.
Here. This line here. That’s not topographical, Magellan. That’s a border. See that? Dash dash dash. If we’re on this side of it, here, amazing. We find the right indicators and we could be on our way to a 250, 300 million dollar play over the next ten years. If we’re on that side, it’s a big fucking zero.
‘What is that.’ You never went camping in the summer? It’s Klua Lakes. A protected area. We can’t do shit in there—do not feed the wildlife, keep off the grass, don’t pee on the trees and sure as shit do not take rock samples from an outcrop so you can find a good place to drill for oil.
Her colleague returns.
Jimmy Peckerhead. What’s the news.
Yes, it’s an outcrop. OK… describe that outcrop.
It’s grey, that’s just great. Look, JP, you don’t have to like being out with mommy on the easter egg hunt but you roll your eyes at me and give me a smart mouth, I’m going to give you a fat lip in return. I got two mostly grown kids that won’t move out or pay rent and a husband who wouldn’t get off the couch if his balls were on fire
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and—believe me—I know how to deal with you. ‘Cause I gotta tell you, JP, you can bet your ass that I’m gonna remember that…
NOWIKCX …long time ago, everybody got tattoo. Thousand thousand year ago. Teenage kids, girl in school get them here he points to where a ‘tramp stamp’ would go, tough guy with something around his arm. They do it to feel strong, because thousand thousand year ago, nobody know what to do. Everything is happen around them, happen to them. They see—the world is cruel, is greedy, is, is painful. But the biggest: the world don’t care who they are. They come to someone like me, they say ‘I am special. I want to feel special. I need it. I put this on my body, this wing, this word, this, this fucking tiger, because I tell the world who I am. And so everybody come for a little bit special.
But that’s not what we gonna do. You don’t pick you tattoo, you know dis. I give to you. I choose what you get. How they did thousand thousand… it don’t work. Nobody feel special. They feel ripped off. An they get rid of the tattoo five ten fifteen year later. They say ‘I don wanna this crap on my’ he indicates the ‘tramp stamp’ spot. I give to you, you never wanna get rid of it. Because what I give you I give you for life. I want to…
VISH …take you into a series of antechambers. These buttresses that divide them remind you of a cathedral, I hope, or a ribcage maybe, each one echoing and riffing on the last one, and the effect is meant to be… especially on a day like today where it’s sunny… like you’re heading back into the womb.
Amazing. I’m feeling it right now, this sense of… calmness, rightness is growing in me, even at this terrible, terrible time. I hope can make it to the womb. And I can tell that it helps me, it’s helping me along. That’s so weird, that it helps me. It seems so unlikely. I laughed when I first discovered that. That part of it I didn’t plan at all.
I can’t explain how this piece worked, what kind of…brain chemistry that got pinged in the experience, or maybe a, an unlocking of something subconscious, something a million years old in us. Nobody was ever able to describe her experience of the artwork in any kind of way that… expressed it, or that felt satisfactory or accurate or…. I just stumbled upon the idea and stumbled on the execution, and voilà. It’s all been stumbling.
I have said this all along—what this artwork does for us, it comes from us, from somewhere deep under the layers of our skin. There is no divine thing behind this. It was never a part of my thinking to make this some kind of religious experience. I thought of it more as a, a—‘landscape therapy machine’ is the term that I used to use in my promo package. Whatever else people wrote into this I just want to say again, to just say it, out loud, as I’ve said so many times before—that’s not what I was after in the whole earthshaping movement.
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Jesus, a movement. That’s the last thing I ever wanted this to be. Oh god, what did I do. A grand movement…
NOWIKCX …is gonna take a big, loose, sloppy shit before long.
Long long time ago, everybody gotta choice. ‘You, you the one!’ ‘You deserve it!’ ‘My this, my that!’ ‘Is all up to you!’—
AAUGH! We all go crazy like little kids without naps.
Las’ week dis guy come in here. I give him a real nice featherbird, right up here on his neck, so everyone can see, you know. It was beautiful, full of colour, like you know featherbirds they are.
He unhappy. He don’ like it. I say ‘maybe dere something about your tattoo dat you should tink about, someting you don’ know about yourself.’ An he say ‘I tought about it all afternoon. WhaddamI gonna do wit dis wimpy Featherbird? I don’ like it, I don’ like it. You turn it into a tiger or something.’
‘You no a tiger.’
‘Yes I am a tiger.’
‘No you not. You a featherbird. You only want to be a tiger. If everybody tiger pretty soon we gonna have a village full a bones, you get me?’ The real tiger, she no know she a tiger, or at leas’ not until I do my work. She go home an look in the mirror and she say
‘oh.’
Dis guy, he gonna look in the mirror every day and only see one ting.
He gonna see…
PATI … that it’s Jurassic, yes. Excellent. All through the exposed strata?
Good ol’ law of superposition, excellent. OK, JP. Just what we want. Shale?
Awesome. Bituminous?
You think so. Well, how are we gonna know for sure?
Take a sample. Yes.
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Timmy, how we doing with the map?
We’re good?
You sure?
You 250, 300 mil sure?
All riiight. That’s what I want to hear. Two clicks is close but enough to be safe. We’re gonna find some oil, fellas.
She leads them up to the top of the ridge
Nature’s pipeline. We find the clues in the outcrop, which is where the strata meet the air, then we head two hundred clicks thataway and dig. 3000 metres down. Your samples have got to be thorough, and they’ve got to be clean, precise. That’s how you form a play concept that you can sell to the boss. And it’s gotta be right— your percentages. Every bore hole costs 12 point five million. Every successful well earns ten times that. But your percentage of success has got to be high—at least one in five has gotta produce. Expensive oil is out, fellas—the only way that we beat the Saudis is by going back to the well. I got a twenty five percent hit rate on my wells. And that’s better than Bert, it’s better than Marco at Arrow, it’s better than pretty much anyone else in the city.
You don’t figure this out by sitting at your desk looking at data. Watch the thorns. Don’t get it right by looking at core samples at the University of Calgary. Context! Subtle information that surrounds the outcrop, like what the rise of the land feels like. The layers, the shapes, the, the smell in the air.
You gotta be out on the rock, turn off your phone—turn off your phone Timmy—turn your sniffer on and have a good whiff. That’s the difference between a career and a temp job. I see you guys come and go, every year. Price goes up, price goes down. I walk through the cubicles and you’re like hogs in a barn—sow, sow, bacon bacon sow bacon. But if you can get your sniffer going—
Yeah? Well, if that’s women’s intuition, then I tell you boys, I got a cuntful of intuition about this place. she lets that land, then,
Go get the sample bags from the truck and bring ‘em over…
VISH …to the right spot. OK. I’m here, in the womb.
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she takes a breath and looks around her.
I’m going to describe it as best as I can. I’m going to… I want to… to just… leave a… to say it out loud. And if I had any idea, ANY, whatsoever, I…
What’s the fucking point.
Say it! Just say it out loud so you can hear yourself say it instead of bouncing the words around inside your skull.
I don’t know, I had a… an epiphany. Something is compelling me to, to talk this through. I’ve never had an epiphany in my life, I’ve never looked for an epiphany in any form so this is likely some manifestation of, of, of the hunger, as my body eats itself and… probably finds some hidden cache of hallucinogen stored in my body fat somewhere, some leftovers from a mushroom or a tab or… but whatever.
Something is t… telling me to keep talking this out. Someone. Isn’t that strange.
Something changes in the environment underneath this next speech—her world becomes more comfortable. We as audience members should feel more at ease.
There are… earthen walls surrounding me on three sides. They follow the natural fold and thrust of the land, with a slight overhang that’s bolstered with wood supports that will biodegrade in about a hundred years and bring all of these structures back to something that resembles the foothill that this was before.
Which will be the best thing to happen in the whole mess. It needs to end, they all need to end. We need to end. Let the earth keep going and recover from this, without us.
There is a, a science to the way the walls curve, in harmony with the striations of the original rock—I studied, I did my research. For two years all I did was research on this! At the copyright trial they said ‘She slaps these things together like an industry—people have been doing this in their gardens for centuries.’ I was so mad about that. So, so mad about that. I paid attention to the world, to the geology of the land, the layers and layers and layers underneath. I made observations and, and reproduced them and riffed on them as best as I could. And I made this, I designed this so that when you walk the path that gets here and when you finally stand in this exact place, especially when it’s a sunny day like today, you feel…
Even I don’t have a word for that. I can only describe what’s going through my mind while I stand here. I’m thinking… about having the earth around me, I’m thinking about it enveloping me and… It’s a, a positive feeling, to be enveloped, to be buried, sort of, to feel what’s going on…
PATI
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…way, way down in the earth, fellas. If you follow the geological structures around you, and open your eyes to read the land, you can pretty much accurately predict—
Wait, wait. Hold up, fellas. No, just somethin’ caught my.... Just beyond there—two peaks over. See that outcrop? That one on the north face there. she starts to envision it
Yeah, maybe. Maybe.
You guys get the samples, and call this Site A, that one down there Site B. Sample every metre, starting from the lowest strata. And your labeling has gotta be clear, ordered, A Site B Site, and goddamned legible—I know, I know, ‘what’s a pen?’— legible, or I will spank your bottoms, both of you.
I’ll be back in two hours. You wait by the truck if you’re done before I’m back. My sniffer went off, and I gotta go see if it’s right. I just gotta have a look at the beauty over there before it gets dark. to herself—this is what she has been looking for for a long time
The beauty. There she is.
Cut the crap, Timmy. Go get the gear out of the Ford, ‘cause…
VISH …I think I’m going to stay here, in this spot. Might take ten years, but I’ll be buried here. I’m not leaving.
A beautiful tomb.
She begins to draw in the dirt. As she does, the transformation of the space continues. We begin to see images, petroglyphs, growing around us, on us, on the environment.
Music underneath. Something simple—one instrument. An oboe?
PATI She talks on her phone, through an earbud headset
Hey, Jay, it’s me. Aaahm. Just gonna leave a message ‘cause I’m gonna be out of range in a bit—ahm, I found something good so it’s looking like I’m gonna stay an extra night at the motel. There’s some curry still in the fridge—oh, that’s probably too old by now—just, just order something in.
You can do that, right? Jay?
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catches herself Sorry. I gotta go.
She hangs up
Augh.
VISH My life’s work. Here in the first one--Featherbird.
She carves images with her fingers into the land around her.
Here’s Number eight--Poison fruit. Number nine--The mermaid.
Number ten-- after she carves the image, she looks up, and is startled.
Oh!
You’re here, aren’t you? You’re who I’ve been talking to.
I’m surprised that it’s you.
-I’m not.
Lines with the “-“ in front of them manifest near her and then flutter away from her like birds.
OK. What would you like to talk about.
PART TWO
NOWIKCX I gonna tell you something. We are the only animal, so far as I see, that know about the past and know about the future. An’ because we know about the future, we know that we gonna die. The deer, the raccoon, one day he walk in the woods and ehck, he dead. Big surprise! For us, no big surprise. We get old, cough cough, we gonna die, like we saw our daddy die in the past, like we saw our mummy die in the past. We know it gonna happen to us in the future. And deep deep down under the skin we scared of it.
PATI Yes yes yes Pati. You got it. You still got it. The beauty. It’s gonna be all right.
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She looks up, surprised, and lets a snowflake land on her hand.
Shit. You can’t snow. No.
NOWIKCX Thousand thousand year ago, when dese shapes were made, everyone afraid, all the time. But they don wanna say they afraid because they can’t get anything done if they say it, everybody pick on them if they say it, they jus sit at home and stay in bed if they say it and become a nothing. So they pretend they not afraid. But it don’ work. Not for the long time, it don’ work.
Dat’s why everything, it fall apart all those years ago. Dat’s why we here now, living in de shit.
What I give. It tell the world what you afraid of. It tell everyone. No hiding out. Den you can change. Den you have to change.
I got three story for you. The story, they come from the pictures that people left in dis land thousand thousand ago, right under our feet here in these hills, in the shadow of these mountain. I tell you the stories they got to tell, and then you receive tattoo I’m gonna give you. Stories help me know which one you get, give you whad it is dat you don even know you need. It help you change. And when I choose, I put it right here, he touches someone over you heart, so that it go right into you. An den you feel better.
Music ends
PATI Shit. Where’s the path. I just had the path. It was so clear. North north north, which way’s north? Goddamn snow. I hadn’t counted on snow. It’s just…
VISH …kind of surprising, actually. I smell funny. I smell like fruit and booze. I read about that—that’s what happens when you’re starving to death. You smell like raspberries. she smells her wrists
I smell like dessert. Isn’t that odd. Did you know that?
I’m getting messy I can’t… slipping. I’m going to tell you…
She looks at her fingernails
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-Tell me.
I will, I will. I’ll just describe what’s…
I think this one’s going to come off next. Another failure as a hunter gatherer. And there’s no more animals to hunt anyway. No more grain to gather. Handful of ornamental chicory roots, two weeks ago. A belly full of white decorative clay from a crafted riverbank. I can’t remember my last shit. Weeks.
-Please.
It’s all I have to talk about right now, or at least all I can put together. You’re here. I’m glad. But I’ll talk about my bowel movements all I want.
It’s all that’s happening right now anyway. Just talk. No input, no output. My wrist bones. My biceps. My thighs are sticks. I couldn’t dig a trench if I tried. Couldn’t shape a serpent mound. I sit down and I’m not getting up again. Ever. You could put a steak dinner in front of my face right now and I don’t even know if I could lift it to my mouth. I think I really am screwed.
Lips still work. Tongue. Talking.
-Awesome.
Vish shoots a withering look.
I’m going to talk.
PATI Yes, hello. Hello? Hello? If you can hear me, I’m out near Klua Lakes, just a few clicks west of Klua Lakes, east of Prophet River, and I’m… lost, I guess. I thought I had it but the snow, I didn’t think it was gonna… I think I… need some help. Hello? Hello? God damn it. Gimme a bar, gimme a bar gimme a bar. she holds her phone above her head and waves it around, looking at the phone, hoping for a better signal
I gotta find some high ground. This is where the wilderness training comes in. You got to remember that…
NOWIKCX …my mother tol me story when I was little kid. When I was little kid I’m sick, sick sick all the time. Lotsa people sick sick sick, the land is sick sick sick. An I’m in bed all the time and my mother tol me story all the time. My mother hear them from her mother. My grandmother grandmother grandmother watch them when she young,
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thousand thousand year ago when they still watch. About the lion who don’ know he a king. About the ice girl who lock herself away so no one get hurt. About the man in animal disguise who get discovered only by love. She tell me over an over again.
Those story, not much use I find.
So when I grow up I look to the story in the ground, the ones under our feet. Other story, is good for laugh, but...
Dey don’ help when you have trouble, in you own life, when you need the…
PATI …Peckerheads! Peckerheeeeaaads! God, I wish I knew their real names. Stay calm, take a breath. Keep your head. This is nothing but…
VISH …a magic transformation, you know. It is! When you finally get traction, when people are finally interested in your work. Overnight it’s different. One day you’re an irresponsible young woman wasting her life, doing things that are suspicious, what mom used to call a ‘taker’. And the next everything you touch is magic.
- Did you earn this now?
No! Because literally you have done nothing… nothing different. Met a few people. Did a job. Someone who means something says you’re worthy, deserving, and you are. Magic. Ugly duckling into swan. TA DAAAAHH!
I would like to eat my fame.
I would like to eat my status.
I would dearly, dearly devour my privilege right now, con gusto, let it dribble down my neck. Except everyone hates me now. Now they’ve decided I’m responsible.
-No fault of yours.
No fault of mine, that’s right. Switch turns on, switch turns off. That’s how it goes.
-It’s that simple?
Yes it is. Yes, it is that simple. You have no idea. In the grand scheme all it comes down to is the story.
PATI crashes through the brush, cold.
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PATI Fuck. Fuck fuck. This is the same creek. It’s the same… Exactly the same fucking creek I crossed an hour ago.
NOWIKCX The first story:
These stories may be scored. Again, single instrument.
The story of Featherbird.
Featherbird is the messenger. Featherbird tell the truth in a forest that call out ‘I am great’ or ‘stay away’ or ‘I want fucking now now now!’ Dats not Featherbird. Featherbird, when she born, she very plain. She only have the truth. She don’ need anyting else. But nobody listen to Featherbird. Dey wanna listen to the six-plumed paradebird. Dey wanna hear the warble of the red-throat firewren.
So Featherbird, she make a plan. One day, she find a long golden feather from the Wilson’s powersparrow on de forest floor. An she tuck it into her plume, right on her boomba. An de people, dey say ‘what is dat beautiful bird wit the long golden feather growing out of her boomba?’ And the Featherbird, she sit on a branch an she tell them the truth. But they think she talking about somebody else, about their sister, about their best friend. They don’ know that she talking about them.
And Featherbird she wonder—maybe if I add the downy parts from the emerald rufflejay, den dey listen and dey understand too. So she search and she search for the down of the rufflejay, up an down, in de rocks an in de high parts of trees an in the back of caves. Everywhere everywhere everywhere. She don’ see it. She see lots of rufflejay but no feather, because she don’ know that de rufflejay swallow they feather when they fall out, so nobody know where they been.
One day, finally, she find him. She say rufflejay, I need you downy parts. The rufflejay say ‘my downy parts they very precious to me. Tell you what. I give some to you, but we make a deal. From now on, you can say most of the words—words like ‘good’ ‘blessed’ ‘awesome’ ‘happy’. But there one word you can say no more. You no more can say the word ‘true.’ No biggie deal, yeah? Is only a small word.’ An the featherbird say OK. An she take the downy part and she add it to her topa (his head).
And so she feeling ok, this Featherbird. Is only one word. And she happy, for a while. Until she not. Then she start thinking: ‘somewhere in this world, they gonna hear me, understand me.’ She think if only I have the long blue black wing feather of the Great Westy magpie, I can go anywhere. I can tell my… my thing to anybody, anywhere.
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Magpie hear about the Featherbird. He’s no dummy, he know she coming to see her. Featherbird, she don’t even have to ask the question. He have one waiting when he arrive, long and shiny and blue and black and white. He even know where it gonna go, and Featherbird she have the feather in her wing even before he make the deal— ‘you can talk about anything you want, so long as you don’ talk about anybody else except for yourself.’
And Featherbird fly off, just a little bit off balance from the extra feather in her wing, but she make it work. Now, you know how this go—there gonna be a price, right? In all the stories there gonna be a price. Featherbird she gonna realize what she gave up—tell the truth, talk about the world, not just talk about herself. Alla dat good stuff. But no, Featherbird, she don’ even notice. She fly everywhere, all around the world, she show off her unbalance wing, her downy part, the plume on her boomba, an think about how much the other birds talk about her, all day long. They talk about…
VISH …the first one. This one. An asymmetrical bird dug out of a gentle rise on Uncle Frank’s ranch, within sight of the main barn. ‘It’s muskeg,’ he said. ‘Can’t do a damn thing with it unless I break my back digging a ditch to drain it, so you might as well do your, your what have you. What are you going to do anyway?’
Well, actually I was planning on digging a ditch. ‘Ah-hah. Well, if you can aim for the sluice that’d be a bonus, about 400 yards thataway.’ It’s going to be a curly ditch to make the breast of the featherbird. With a human womb at the centre. A design, Uncle Frank, you know, art. ‘Ah hah.’
-Uncle Frank was no art lover.
No kidding. Not his taste. A spiral based on the math, each distance increasing on itself—1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21 34 55 89 and so on, round and round until it reaches the edge of the woods. 1.78 acres. With cross paths and rammed earth detailing.
Perhaps we see the design manifest in the space as she describes it.
Plumed tail at the apex in the southwest corner of the property. Small bird motifs around the periphery, and the intersection points, based on the ratios—2/1, 3/2, 5/3, 8/5. I still can’t say that I understand why the overall effect worked. But it did.
It does! Right now, it does!
-Congratulations.
Thank you. beat You’re being sarcastic, aren’t you.
-Of course.
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Why would you be anything else.
- What kind of happy?
Huhhh. That’s a good question. What kind of happy. I feel… peaceful here. Connected. I’m starving to death, I’m talking to someone who I know isn’t really there—
- I am here. but I’m happy. Some kind of happy, even though it’s… just terrible here. Just awful. I’m going to die here and it’s just awful. But I’m glad it’s here, not some clearing in a forest, not some, some street corner with disintegrating concrete where the animals—
-They will feast.
—they will feast on me, but with a kind of purpose. I don’t mind being eaten, if it’s here. I’ll disintegrate like a dead jackrabbit here and dissolve into the earth over the next few years, and become a part of this work, finally. A purpose.
-Luxury.
I know. Not everybody got to have a purposeful death.
-Is that fair?
Why would that be unfair.
-You know why.
I don’t!
-They died.
Don’t do that. Don’t—
-We did.
Can you not, please, I don’t—
-All of us.
You don’t get to do this. It’s not fair—
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-Face down
It’s not fair to bring that up! Not now.
-skinny
Stop it!
-exhausted
I DON’T WANT TO TALK ABOUT THAT. Why? Why should I? What difference does it make for me to end my days either in peace or in… crippling, agonizing, terrorizing despair? If I’m going to end either way why can’t it be different?
-Sorry.
Are you? Sorry?
- I am. pause
You know, I’m surprised to hear that. You have never backed down from an argument with me. Your whole life. I am genuinely surprised. Can you…
PATI She has one ear bud in her ear and is talking through the earphone mic, looking at her phone.
…actually hear this? Red button. Ah, Jay. Ahhhhh…. I think this is recording. She looks at the graphics on her phone Spinny spinny spinny I think that means… Ah, 11 seconds yes. Jay, ahhhh… I hope this isn’t what I think it is, I’m just… she breathes hard and stays calm out here and I can’t find… the road and the truck and the guys and it’s been six hours and there’s no signal out here, no matter where I go or what I climb so… I’m just really really cold and it’s getting dark and… I don’t know what to do. So I’m going to talk to you, because you’re my husband and I’m supposed to be able to talk to you so I’m going to talk to you while I try to get myself out of here and… find a road and and… just in case I’m going to talk. Please, please don’t play this to Bree and Tan. I just wanna talk to you.
What do I want to say.
I guess, I’m sorry or something like sorry. I’m supposed to say I’m sorry. And I am, but only with… context. Subtle information that surrounds the sorry. I want to tell you about…
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VISH …the second one. I didn’t think there would be a second one. Didn’t need to be a second one. Except when Uncle Frank’s summer-home neighbours from the city came by. ‘It’s a revelation,’ she squealed. ‘A goddamned experiential revelation! The line, the curve. When I sit here, right in this very place, I’m a human being again, not someone who just consumes and shits.’
-Judgy.
Yes, totally judgy. But she was right, you know. That’s exactly it; I just didn’t know it at the time. Right here. At the centrepoint. In the womb. A knowledge. You are a human, you are a beast, and also…
-An angel?
Yes! An angel. The, the experience!
That’s what they were after. All of them. And so I made a second one. Bigger. Wheels within wheels. A flock of birds. A home where the buffalo roam. A home…
PATI …that we’ve shared for so long, Jay, you and me. So, so long.
I’m sorry that I pulled away, Jay. You know what I’m talking about. Over twenty one years. Or twenty two, which one are we on?
I love you, Jay, you know that I do. I can tell that I do. And still, it’s just chip chip chip away at our marriage. The first few years, just such a blur, we were in it with Bree so damn quick we didn’t even get a chance to… and really, we didn’t have any kind of idea at all how… How were we supposed to help each other out. Most people can just barely do it, even when they’re prepared, even when they feel they had a choice in the whole thing. You just gotta survive it as best as you can with what’s in you, that’s what I was doing. And then Tan just as we were getting back on our footing. We just never really went back to the way it was before between us, that closeness, or maybe back didn’t really seem relevant anymore. I can see that one distance breeds another distance. I get that.
So I’m sorry. If I get home I promise you that I will change.
That. That part of me I will change.
But there’s this other part, Jay, this is the thing that I need to talk to you about, I know, I can hear you now—‘you thought you were going to die and so you decided to nag at me one more time?’ And ha ha ha, that’s super funny, Jay, but I need to… talk to you about this.
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It’s about how we’ve made the life that we’re in right now. I’ve been busting my ass for years now, Jay, years. And I know, we’ve talked about this—I like my job and you don’t like yours. That’s fair. Not everybody’s got to love their job. And so, yes, it was OK that you scaled back—I wanted you to have more time for, for whatever, the kids, the house, whatever hobby or interest you wanted to try. You were going to play drums with Brian and Jonno again. Something to make you happy again. I didn’t mind taking more responsibility on if it meant that you were happier in your life. I thought you’d find some different way to engage, to, to find some… joy in your living. Not happiness, joy.
But that didn’t happen, and you know that and no I don’t want to fight about that again but it’s true that what we agreed to didn’t happen. I don’t know what’s going on in your head, I just see you on the couch with your phone or a remote in your hand and not healthy and not… and… that wasn’t the plan. And you won’t talk to me and so I won’t talk to you or I won’t talk to you so you won’t talk to me or whatever.
There’s just been distance. A huge amount of distance. Everywhere. And I know I should have talked to you about what was happening at work during the bust but I didn’t because… yeah. Honestly, Jay, I didn’t think that I could. Or maybe I just didn’t want to. I mean what were you going to do about it except to say a few things that you were supposed to and go back to your newsfeed? But this is why I was so angry all the time.
We knew, three weeks in advance. We knew the company was hurting, or was planning to be hurting, that’s what they do, they have the surgery even before the injury happens, that’s how it works. Three weeks I had to worry about it—who was going to stay and who was going to go. Because you don’t know, Jay—Shirley was there since Lougheed, and she was done, you know, just gone. And on Black Tuesday, that’s what we called it, you were instructed, instructed to be in your office by 8:30 and wait. You had to wait for them to come for you. I packed up all my stuff, the pictures of the kids, our camping photos, the mugs Bree and Tan gave me each Mothers’ Day, my service awards, years of them, every photo of every producing well I ever made happen, all packed up in two office boxes, and I waited.
It was like we were waiting to be devoured.
We all waited. Nobody could work. Nobody really worked for the three weeks leading up to Black Tuesday, I don’t know what they were thinking, letting us know that far in advance that the hammer was going to fall. Everyone just spent their days putting out feelers instead of working, you know, “I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t mention this to anyone but I’m wondering how so and so is working out, and if there’s room on the team for someone with experience in blah blah blah.”
Black Tuesday. We were all messaging, throughout the whole building—Kalima’s getting it, I can hear them, her office is next to mine! Poor Kalima! Margaret just walked past my door and she was crying! They knock at the door, HR hands you a
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letter and gives a little pre-written speech and then they take your keys and a security guard escorts you to the front door so you don’t make a scene or try to steal anything or wreck anything on your way out, like a teenager. People that worked there for ten, fifteen, twenty years. I guess some people do that. And I’m following all the names—Jane goes, then Hue in accounts payable. Each department in order, really methodic, Jay, sweeping through the floors like men with dogs and flashlights while we wait for them to come.
Helpless.
And then it’s our turn—Exploration and Production. And they’re coming closer and closer, Jay, and I’ve got my boxes stacked and I’m taking one last look around. And I hear them knock on Brooke’s door next to mine and there’s hard, short words from her in a voice that I’ve never heard before—she’s so sweet all the time but there she goes, arguing, not going down without a fight, wow, Brooke! but sure enough, she goes down, silent forced politeness as they take her to the elevator, and they’re coming down the hall, Jay, they’re coming for me, I can hear their footsteps, hard soled oxfords and the tromp of military boots outside my door—
And then suddenly, they’re gone. They’ve moved to another floor. It’s quiet. They’ve passed over. And the office doors open, one by one, and people look out at each other, see who’s left.
And we go back into our offices and close the doors again until Bill and Nick give us the required ‘this is a good thing’ talk in the afternoon.
Fatima, Michelle, Leona, Sarena and Brooke are all gone. And I’m back to being the only woman on the floor. Like it was twenty years ago, when I started.
Jay, I peed on a stick at the motel when I woke up this morning. It said 3+ weeks. I won’t read you the whole blue line red line thing in the instructions. Just, that’s. That’s. That’s significant. Jay. Which makes me think of…
NOWIKCX …Number two:
The story of the poison fruit
Once there was this young woman, she live in tiny, tiny village. Backwater burg. She sick of it—same people, no fun, no life, no good food. One day word come to village about the City of Cups, big big, fun fun city, a long long away. They say ‘they throw open the gates to City of Cups for three days. For three days you can come in. City of Cups, it change your life forever. In City of Cups, you be who you really be. Everyone want to go. Only thing is—when the City is full, no more people can come. Is first come, first served.’
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And immediately, she pack her thing, she don’t even think twice, she pack all the important thing in a backpack and she leave. But so does everyone else. And she running and running and as she run, every time someone run past her, faster than her, she get scared. Whad if I get all the way there, and they say ‘no, we full. Go home!’ She know that she can no longer stay in backwater burg. If she stay there, she gonna die inside. So she run as fast as she can.
But she get tired. An she slow down. An more an more people run pas’ her. She about to give up when she see an old man by the side of the road. Long beard, ragged clothes, red, watery eyes. He gotta basket of fruit. He say ‘hey girlie. I know where you going. You take this fruit, you run fast, you get there before all the rest.’ She say ‘how much?’ He say ‘oh, not much. You take this one for free an see how you like.’ And she say thank you.
She eat the fruit and, just like the old man said, she go fast fast fast! She pass all the people that pass her that day, she pass other people heading to the City of Cups from other backwater burg. She speed through mountain pass, she speed through forest, she crossing rivers like they just little brooks.
But after a while she slow down again. An the people she pass begin to pass her again. She think I never gonna get there in time! An she just about to lose hope, when she see a little girl, big brown eye, pony tail, froofy jeans, with a fruit basket! She ask ‘little girl, is that magic fruit?’ and the girl, she say ‘oh yes.’ And she say ‘how much?’ An the girl say ‘oh not much. You take this one for free an see how you like.’
And she eat the fruit and bang bang bang, off she go again, like her pants on fire! She speed through mountain pass, she speed through forest, she crossing rivers like they just little brooks. An everybody eat her dust.
Until she slow again. An other people pass, they tearing up the road as they go by, pieces of asphalt hitting her in the teeth while she run. An she notice that other people, they eating the fruit too! An again, she about to lose hope, when she see a young man, collar shirt, big white teethy, again with the fruit basket. She ask ‘is that magic fruit?’ and the young man, he say ‘yes.’ An she say ‘do you give fruit to other people too?’ An he say ‘yes, but for a while, you run fastest.’ And she say ‘how much?’ An the young man show his white teethy and say ‘oh not much. You take this one for free an see how you like.’
Well, she starting to worry now, but she eat the fruit anyway. And she run run run. She speed through mountain pass, she speed through forest, she crossing rivers like they just little brooks. But now she notice—I seen this mountain pass before. I know this forest. That river, it just like the one I cross before. I been running in circle for three days an I never, never get to the City of Cups!
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As she realize this, she see the old man, the little girl, and the young man on the road up ahead. They holding the fruit basket, all together. And they smile at her. And they…
VISH …beat a path to my door after the second. Everyone. Everyone. Number three was the first commission. A hedge fund manager with a little blond cookie on his arm— he said “the rest will come when I’m satisfied. And I want it big, big big.” Ten acres this time, a parcel he bought a few years back and didn’t know what to do with. A tiger motif, long claws, which I guess appealed. He had notes, he had to have notes on principle, to show who’s boss. But he bawled until his nose ran when he stepped into the sweet spot. All of his golfing buddies did too. Ugly, ugly ugly crying. He paid me cash on the spot, with an extra twenty five percent, just pulled out a wad of bills and shoved them in my hands, tax free. And my phone rang and rang all day long.
-Like a drug.
Everyone said yes, for the first time in my life.
Carte blanche on number four. 21, no 22 acres this time, just to show up number three. No notes from the boss either, he just wanted to sit in it on his days off. Geometric shapes, no animal motif. It was an experiment. Something was off about it. I wanted to tear it all down with my hands, go back to the bald prairie and start over again, but there were people lining up by that time, and I couldn’t.
Five six and seven are a blur. I couldn’t say no. I was so used to being broke before I started all of this that I was afraid to say no—who knows what’s going to happen in the future? You gotta make hay—
-You’re broke now.
Right! So I didn’t say no. I worked 20 hours a day, no assistants, clawing through the dirt, sleeping in a pup tent out on the site. I was exhausted. I got ringworm on five, scabies on six, and then shingles on seven and still didn’t stop. I cranked them out. Cranked. Them. Out. Thinking about six while working on five, thinking about seven while working on six. Interviews, catering, making invitations for openings at three in the morning. Irritated. A woman places a hundred pounds of your favourite food in front of you and says ‘now clean your plate.’ I think I threw up four times on number seven.
Finally got smart on number eight. Got interns to do the digging, the footings, the buttresses, and spent my hours imagining, planning, drawing and redrawing. A poisoned fruit. But it wasn’t… there was no… magic in eight.
-Why are you telling me this?
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It helps. To talk about it. To trace the path. To remember how I got here. So maybe I can find my way back.
-You’re not going back.
I know. I just think—if there’s no hope I…
-You’re hiding.
I don’t know what you mean.
-I think you do.
Eight! Eight was hard. Sterile. I felt detached. I wasn’t talking with the work as I made it—someone else did it and it was… workmanlike. Workwomanlike. It unfolded just as we had agreed it would, nothing more. Eight needed to get laid, seriously laid. Good and fucked. And still, they bawled when they stepped into it. They sniffled even before they entered. And that made me feel even more detached. How come they couldn’t see that I was faking. They were faking. They were expected to cry. They dutifully paid good money to cry, and so they dutifully cried. Disgusting.
It was a dark time.
-No, this is dark.
Nine! The mermaid. I didn’t feel much in those times. Drank a little too much, did risky things. Showed up for meetings a little in my cups. The clients thought it was charming.
But then ten. Ten came out of nowhere.
Ten I loved. Dearly, I loved ten like a daughter. It was a miracle—straight from the planning. One thousand acres. The idea just poured out of me. And fields of volunteers to make it a reality, with me there every day to listen to it, to talk to it. Shape, undulations, every step led inevitably, effortlessly to the next. some alteration of the performance space happens under the following
All I had to do was dream, design.
Animals
Leaves
Creatures that didn’t exist but did when I was finished with them
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Light
Line
I crafted the texture of the world under your feet, told your soles to speak to you, and they did, they prophesied, they sang to the walkers.
And people fell apart inside number ten. They wept for their mothers and were held by them at the same time. They skipped work, took vacations, they brought food, bales of stuff, so they could stay there for weeks. They wanted to live there. A thousand people every day, give or take.
I’m telling you, they never, ever wanted to leave. And I thought it was amazing, at first. Everything I dreamed of. Until…
PATI: …I watched a documentary last night. You don’t know this Jay, but I watch documentaries when I stay in motel rooms. I don’t do it at home because I know you hate them. I’m not sure why I do that.
They cut all the trees down on Easter Island. It used to be a jungle, like Fiji or Samoa. But now it’s bare rock that hardly supports a few handfuls of sheep. They didn’t even want to burn them or build houses. They used the logs to roll these huge stone statues of men from their quarries to the edge of the island so they could look out at the ocean. It bugs me. What good is that, Jay? Why would someone do that to their home? It doesn’t make any sense.
And for that matter what are we doing so wrong that we don’t want to have kids anymore? Or can’t, actually, is the better term. We can’t have kids or everything falls apart. Our grandparents had like eight, nine kids, and lost two more. And no, I don’t want to do that, believe me. But at the same time why does this have to be such bad news? What are we doing so wrong that the arrival of a baby is bad news? After all, it’s…
VISH: …not like I made them buy up all of my works, and then everything else afterward.
-Is it their fault?
Well it is kind of their fault. I didn’t ask them to do that.
-But they did.
I just make the stuff. I’m not responsible for what happened afterward.
-But something happened.
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I know! I just, I don’t want to talk about…
NOWIKCX …number three:
The mermaid
Once there was a fisherman, who thought he was very poor. His wife, his kids, they all wanna new thing all the time. They ask him ‘why no large fish in you net? Why we gotta eat and sell these dinky fish? Why we need to be so poor alla time? This here, this is chump life.’
Fisherman, he put upon. He need something to soothe himself. He run out to the rocks by the sea an throw himself down and cry for a bit.
You know how that go.
An while he sit on the rocks he hear a wavy water voice: ‘why you cry, my friend?’ An he look up an he see a mermaid in the water. She pull herself up on the rocks beside him, pat his leg. He said ‘I got troubles. I only catch little tiny fish in my net.’ She say ‘no problem. I fix.’
An she swish her split fishy tails and down she disappear.
Next day when he pull in his net, he can barely do! They so full a big fish! An he take them home an he sell them at a big big price, and his family eat them an his kids got gootchy gadget, an everybody, everybody happy.
But next morning he notice a little tear in his net. But still, he pull in big fish. Everybody happy. Next day, same thing, big fish, but another tear, a little bigger. Next day, same thing—big fish, big tear. He tryin to fix net, he up all night repairing with wax string by the fire, but no, every day, a new bigger hole! An he losing most of his fish, big and small!
One day his son don’t come home from the market. He gone all night. And next morning he come back an he say ‘papa, let me tell you. I see the mermaid las night. She gotta two tail. With her one tail she herd all the big fish into you net, but then with the other one, she tear a hole again.
An the man say to his son ‘I know, son. But she still do what she say—she bring big fish, right? That’s not half bad. At least, I have a big fish for a while.’ And the son he get mad. He yelling at his papa…
VISH …YOU ALWAYS SAY THAT. What did I do to earn that kind of judgement?
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-You know.
‘Oh you know.’ That’s your trick! You don’t ever have to bring up a charge—you just count on the fact that I feel guilty. All the time. Inherently guilty.
-Responsible.
Yes, responsible. Perpetually responsible. Jesus. All my fucking life, perpetually responsible.
-Except you’re actually responsible.
I KNOW. I know. Thank you for underlining that.
-You need to tell the truth.
I AM telling the truth.
-You’re not.
I AM.
-Not much time left.
OK. OK. This is what happened. I may have started it but it wasn’t something I did, something that I planned, it was other people. Honestly. truthfully Honestly.
My assistant, she comes to me one day, she says ‘do you know about the parcel of land by Black Creek Mountain? The foothill—twenty five hundred acres. There’s a work crew shaping it right now. It looks like half of three and half of five.’ I go down there to see for myself. There’s no artist, just a foreman. He says ‘it’s not a copy, it’s a, it’s a whaddyacallit, a home-age, a parody. Totally legal. And by the way, it’s already sold so you probably need to step off this land.’ I say ‘how much did you get paid for this’ and he says ‘I’m going to refer you to our Communications Officer. Here’s her card. And did I mention that you should get off this land if you haven’t been invited?’
And I ask my people. And we take it all to court. They say there’s nothing to be done—it’s the land after all, you’re just rearranging it. Like any schlep could do the same and achieve the result—the tears, the epiphanies, the vows to change your life.
They say there’s at least some gratification in knowing that I put an idea into the world that is making so many people happy.
Do I look happy?
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And Black Creek Mountain is just the first. There are many, many, many more. Everywhere I go. I can’t eat. I’m angry all the time. I stop going out because…
PATI …I’m just tired of it all, Jay. None of this makes sense to me anymore. I’m forty five and up the spout and I’m tired of fighting everything. I want things to be easier. Everywhere. This is the thing, Jay. I don’t think I have any options left.
It’s a tricky time, Jay. At work. They’re looking for reasons, even now they’re looking for reasons. And I know, I know “because it’s 2015” but that’s not the real world, Jay. They’ll find a reason—a woman on parental leave is all bore hole and no production. And if I go then what are we going to do, Jay. How are we going to…
This new baby, it… introduces a layer of chaos that… Jay, I… I just don’t think we’ll survive, you know? I don’t think we’re able to change like that. I feel scared saying that out loud because I know when I say it that it’s true.
I don’t know what happens to this little thing if we don’t survive it.
It’s like… the size of a poppy seed right now, according to the website. Right…
NOWIKCX …Now. You picture. You tattoo. You tell me you need something so you can change. I can give this to you, because everything need to change. No fear just love. No mine just ours. Thousand thousand year ago they don’t change and they fuck it all up, and you don’ wanna do that again. So we looking to…
VISH The land. The land. It only took seven years and we fucked it all up. Every square inch is owned, shaped, whatever things of value that were there before have been demolished. My idea for thousands of miles in all directions, and nobody wants anything else. And I can’t change any of it. I caused it but I can’t change a damn thing. A mashup of my designs, me-esque, carved out wherever they’ll fit, over fields, roads, power plants, mountains. They’re all ugly. Sentimental. Baby talk.
-Snob.
It’s not being a snob, it’s… righteous indignation! They stole from me!
-This is important now?
Well I could have eaten for years on the money I would have earned.
-For money?
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For me, for our family. I could have bought people off! An extra bag of grain, a bushel of rotten apples! We could have lived! Terry, mom, dad. pause
Not skinny, all ribs and femurs, facedown and… devoured outside the front door! That shouldn’t happen to anyone. pause
-Nothing to buy now.
No.
Everybody’s fucked now.
I’m just fucked sooner than some of them and it’s not fair. she is suddenly exhausted
OK. That’s the end of it. I… I need to sit down now. So long standing. Goodbye walking. I sure liked walking. she sits, gingerly, the reverse of a newborn fawn getting to its feet.
-- PART THREE
NOWIKCX I have special design for you. We gonna bring it up.
He divines, breathing deeply. The environment begins to change, moving with him as he breathes. Vish’s petroglyphs return.
I give you this to think about what is it gonna happen in a thousand year.
VISH And they won’t go back. Nobody’s planting, nobody wants to. Nobody can.
NOWIKCX To think about what is it gonna happen in the next ten minutes.
VISH They want to sit and cry and be nostalgic about their grandparents, remember their fourth summers playing in the creek. They want to orgasm simultaneously with their first loves, improbably, over and over and over again.
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NOWIKCX Featherbird, the poison fruit, the split-tailed mermaid…
VISH …The, the blue light, are you doing that?
-No, that’s you.
Dammit. The mind is a bitter creature when the body hasn’t been fed. OK.
NOWIKCX Oh my god. I know you tattoo. This gonna get weird.
VISH breathes deeply
I think this is going to get weird.
Music. The petroglyph of the angelbeast appears
PATI Slumped down against a tree trunk
Jesus God help me. I’m so cold. Come on. Get up. Gotta keep going. While your body still works. she starts recording again.
Uhhh, that’s it, Jay. I got ten percent left on the battery so I guess I’m done, that’s all I’ve got to say. Is that all I’ve got to say? Who cares. Played out. I’m gonna do my best to get out of this, but… Goodbye Jay. I love you.
I do.
I really do. she stops recording.
OK. On your own. Get up. Get up.
NOWIKCX The angelbeast. When I woke up today I din’ think I was gonna see the angelbeast. Is gonna be your tattoo. So get ready.
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He traces the petroglyph, as if preparing
She is angry. And stupid. The beast, she gotta big claws. She tear you up, rip out a grave for you. She don’ care. She lie to your face an take what she want so she can eat. Is part of you.
But then this, this, the holy glow, what touch you, what make you think of the stars above. Dat’s the angel. Both parts go together. That is what we were thousand thousand thousand years ago. And it is what we are now too, you know? If we gonna change.
PATI she staggers to her feet, falls down, then gets up again
Up, Pati. A little higher. Up to the ridge. You can do it. One more climb. Over that ridge right here, you’re going to find what you need to find.
I think I— I think I’m losing my feet.
Wait. Wait wait wait.
She looks around
Well isn’t this the most… messed up… of all the…
NOWIKCX Angelbeast is the thing we know deep inside, all the time. When we got no angel, we yell at our kids and tell our lovers to go to hell. We hate the weak. We lie, lie, lie, lie to everyone and to ourselves, and we love them that lie to us.
But when we got no beast, we devoured, and quickly too.
PATI This is the outcrop. The beauty. I’m right at the base of it. They knew where I was heading—if I can get to the top, maybe I can signal or something.
Work your hands. Climb, Pati. Do it! Come on, smart girl, use your brain. Come on. You know the layers. The Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin. Up! Up! she begins to climb
NOWIKCX Maybe there’s no angel no more. Maybe angel ehck when everything else go to hell, thousand thousand year ago. How is there angel with so much damage?
But I don’ believe so.
Easter Island by David van Belle Draft 4-- July, 2017 p. 32
Maybe the beast gonna rage for a while. But the angel, she still there. She come forward if we gonna change.
Angelbeast is the most important picture of all. I done it maybe two, three time before only in fifty year.
But she come with a responsibility: you gotta see her in the flesh.
And honey, you gotta be ready for Angelbeast.
So if you ready, I’m gonna start.
Ten.
PATI Jurassic aquitard, yes…
Moving into the Cretaceous, Bullhead formation and the Lower Mannville aquifer…
NOWIKCX Nine.
Eight.
Seven.
PATI Now the Ft. St. John Group—Wilrich formation,
Nitkewin & Fahler formation,
The Harmon formation,
Shaftsbury formation,
NOWIKCX Six.
Five.
Four.
PATI
Easter Island by David van Belle Draft 4-- July, 2017 p. 33
Late Cretaceous, the Cardium formation, layers and layers of ancient cockle shells.
NOWIKCX Three
PATI Tertiary era
NOWIKCX Two
PATI Quaternary era, some evidence of glacial drift
Last metre…
NOWIKCX Nowikcx voice is altered as he speaks the last number: OOOONNNNEEEE—
As Pati reaches the top of the outcrop, the environment changes drastically. Suddenly it’s warm—her physical ailments drop away. Over the next section the petroglyph of the AngelBeast begins to manifest throughout the space, as if Nowikcx is tattooing it on each audience member as she possesses him. Vish, eventually, begins to rise as well.
PATI Anthropocene! An angel’s head. A magpie’s wing.
Helicopter sound begins in the distance and increases over the following pages
VISH OK. OK. OK. she moves as if the ground is shifting under her bum
It’s alive. I always knew it was alive. People always told me it felt alive. I thought it was a metaphor.
-I don’t do metaphor.
No, you don’t. You’re very literal. And this… is… trip-py. Literally.
Tripping. I’m tripping, can’t get my…oh.
PATI A fishy tail that curls and splits.
Easter Island by David van Belle Draft 4-- July, 2017 p. 34
VISH Ohhhhh. The angel’s head. There it is. Every detail I crafted. That crook around the eyes—I obsessed over that crook for two whole days.
PATI A smile and a basket and a rotting apple.
VISH You see me. You understand.
NOWIKCX he breathes heavily, and speaks as the Angelbeast. His voice is altered. Perhaps her words sparkle across the space in a manner similar to the words in Vish’s speeches.
CENTURIES ARE THE SAME. YOU ARE THE SKIN OF THE LEAF, AND THERE ARE THOUSANDS UPON THOUSANDS OF LEAVES ON JUST ONE TREE.
VISH the helicopter sound grows in intensity
Oh! There’s like, a million birds overhead right now. A million! Magpies, jays, seagulls. A little cloud of wrens, merging and separating. They’re rising up out of the ground, it’s like every blade of grass I seeded has sprouted into a wren, each one its very own wren!
She laughs
Amazing! They were under my feet the whole time! I didn’t know, I couldn’t tell, even with my nose down in the dirt, digging and shaping.
You knew this, didn’t you. Of course you did. You were there under my feet, in between my fingers the whole time.
PATI Bedrock, regolith, subsoil, hypodermis, eluviation, topsoil, humus.
VISH The angel opens its mouth unto me. Animals! Small animals pouring out of its mouth! Marmots and ground squirrels and field mice! Oh!
They are all around her. She is not afraid.
Scurry Flutter Creep
Easter Island by David van Belle Draft 4-- July, 2017 p. 35
Lope Glide Wheel Dart
PATI Perimetrium. Muskiki Formation. Myometrium. Wapiabi Formation. Endometrium. Blackstone Formation.
NOWIKCX ONE STRATA OF ROCK. TEN MILLION YEARS AND YOU, THE LAYER OF DUST ON THE TOP. YOU MUST CHANGE, AGAIN, AND AGAIN, AND AGAIN.
VISH rising to her feet with fluidity and strength
A rummage of little legs Six baskets of feathers Fourteen cobs of corn Twenty two days without food Nine wishes for you and me Ten works of art A breath--
She sucks her breath in sharply
PATI Jay! A baby! A baby in our home! the helicopter sound increases in intensity
VISH In the angel’s mouth. A mother and child. They’re safe. They’re safe.
NOWIKCX IN THIS BLINK. IN THIS THIN SLICE. REACH YOUR HAND, TAKE HOLD— THE HAND, THE ROOT, THE AIR, THE SMILE. REACH LONG, ACROSS TIME AND TOUCH.
NO MOVEMENTS, NO MONUMENTS, ONLY MOMENTS. THE MOMENT. THE MOMENT. THE MOMENT. THE MOMENT.
A beam of light strikes Pati from above, almost as if she’s about to be abducted by aliens.
She looks up at the light and waves.
Easter Island by David van Belle Draft 4-- July, 2017 p. 36
PATI Hi! Hi! I’m over here!
NOWIKCX THE MOMENT.
Nowikcx collapses. The helicopter sound cuts out, abruptly.
The moment. The moment. long pause. He recovers.
I’m sorry. I don’ know... what is it that… what did she tell you?
I warned you.
He holds for a minute, then pulls himself together, exhausted, emotional. He points to audience members’ hearts, as if he has placed the tattoo on each of them during his possession.
That gonna swell for a few days. Keep clean. If it get angry red, get pus, get stinky, you gotta come back and see me. But is gonna be all right.
You strong. You have to change. Is gonna be all right. he tears up again
She so… I can’t… I gotta…
Go. Go. he exits. The image of the AngelBeast lingers in the space, on the walls, on the audience, and then fades.
END OF PLAY