(Doors:)

Be careful. The green light over the door youíre thinking about means--

well

Violent hings are happening behind that door.

Are they indescribable?

No. Thereíre not indescribable. But you have to be willing to use words you may not be willing to use

--------

Are you who I think you are

I donít know who you think I am.

I donít think you as my my friend,.

If I am not your friend, that could also be a source of energy,

Yes, it could

Do you know what Iím imagining? Iím imagining a friendly game of field hockey --each of you leading one team of friends against another team.of friends. But perhaps I should say-- a rough and tumble game of field hocky.

Somebody could get hurt

I think Iíll go into the next room

Oh? Do you have any idea whatís in the next room?

Not really

Should we find out together?

(others in, hockey))

What I find unsettling is the way everything is turning into something else

Then all prophicies are fulfilled

This is a strange room. The things that happen in this room--

What

Happen, I think, most of all, so that this room can be a witness to the things that happen

can all of those things be put into words.

I think so.

I challenge you to a rough and tumble game of field hockey

I think what you say is very believeable

Of course. because what happens in this room --are specificaly things that this room is able to transform into something else.

Ah, a chair--

There is no chair--

Turns into a table--

There is no table.

A door opening--

(opens)

But there is a door opening.

It raches out to me like a giant hand stroking my forehead until my head starts spinning and I fall to the carpet.

(Falls)

Have some drugs to give you back the power of speech.

Quiet, as others shrink back)

No. My words are my problem, shit head. My problem is the words I most want to use, the words that obcess me because they do obcess me, you total piece of stinking shit, cunt, fuck, mother fucking, piece of shit, asshole, stinking rotten whore asshole cunt shit faced shithead.

(Pause)

What does my consciousness know of such things, really

Nothing. Which is why a belief systems such as you propose sustains a world that is increasingly unbearable to me

I would have thought the opposite

See? I register you only in the light of my own pitiful desires and expectations

Ah, you are indeed then-- my spiritual twin, my un-nameable shadow--

I thought so. I have already imagined embracing you

Then we have already embracedIn his room, there is a mirror that remembers everything

You mean, everything that has been reflected on itís surface. Or everything that has been reflected in its depths.

It makes your head spin, doesnít it

A mirror is the only thing, in a world of problems, I find believeable

This table you find problematic?

Of course

But the mirror in which it is rflected-- not problematic

Believeable

Ah, thatís not the same word

I chose my words very carefully

Ah, I suddenly notice

Right

Whatís right

The mirror reflects a table, but not a spoken word

(Pause)

I suddenly resalize youírfe able to read thoughts

No-- the same thought suddenly occured to both of us at once

Thatís suddeness if I ever heard of suddeness

Unfortunately, the one thing a mirror lacks is ears

Iíd say it lacks everything

Even eyes?

Especially eyes

(Pause)

Depth?

(Pause)

You see? We seem to be turning it into something problematic

Iíll never agree to that

Right now, itís lying

Thatís not problematic at all

Whatís your definition of being problematic

I have no definitions for things-- I just have things

Have a seat

(Pause)

Problematic?

Of courseWhen the girl Iím thinking about entered my field of vision, I said, ah-- you are not my friend.

I challenged her to a rough and tumble game of field hocky-- no holds bared-- or was in the other way around?

I canít remember!

But I remember, much to my surprise, she presented me with a gift, only as I unwrapped the package-- her smile turned cold, because in accepting her gift, I confounded his expectations;

totally.

At least that was my understanding.

Thatís the kind of person she was. An enigma.

And the gift was something . . .awesome. A small gold disk with the letters of the alphabet embossed on one side. And I said to myself-- is my own name, hidden amongst those letters?

I looked at the side that was empty-- this side is even more pregnant, I said to myself.

I held the blank side of the disk up to a mirror, and itís nothingess was reversed.

And I was intellectually tumbled by a wave of emotion as I realized that nothingness reversed --induced in me-- a whole range of possibilities I had not the means to mentally articulate to myself.

I knew my own limitations, God damit!

I realized suddenly-- one must always be willing

to insert the available key

into the not always available lock.

and one has to be willing to turn, nevertheless, the key inside whaever lock does present itself to such a provocative gesture

These seemed like simple tasks, really

In fact, they were simple

But there was a tremendous inner resistence to the first move,

the ininitation of that sequence.

Why this inner resistence to something so simple?

This is a mystery

This is a true mystery

which makes the blook

run to my head in preperation for some violent explosion

(Open door)

Now-- look for the key, which is taped under the edge of the table inside the second room

But I just used this key to open this door

No. The key is hidden on the underside of the table in the next room

What about this key

Trust me

Is there another door?

No. Thatís the door

Did I open it?

You did

Then who do I need the other key?

Trust me. (other woman)

Could I trouble you for a drum?

A drum

Yes-- Iíd like to make some noise

I bet

I smile. Iíd really like to make some noise

Did you think Iíd provide a drum?

I consider you my equal

She holds to her principals. This is why she suffers

Yes, I remember once-- On a trip through the mountains, she drives more carefully than on the highway leading away from the city. Or does he? What does it mean to drive more carefuly. More attention given to steering, one would suppose. Yes, she never non-steers.

Her sex is a recognizable part of his personality. She hides it in other things

What I have for you is a special kind of gift

.

I donít believe you

Look inside this hankerchief as I unfold it . Do you see anything?

I do

What?

A substance

Does it frighten you? Imagine biting into it, and swallowing a mouthful

What isnít allowed-- is that I swallow a mouthful; of this substance and turn completely into --whoever I am not

or whatever I am not. as a person

You wouldnít be the first person to have bitten into this substance

I donít think you understand

What donít I understand

You donít understand the significance of this substance chewed upon and swallowed in terms of the personal ecstacy that is my private system of being here in my own body

OK-- I donít understand

Let me show you something

(chop off hand, blood , screams)

Thatís a trick, isnít it?

What did I do

You chopped off your hand

Was it a trick

I think so

But an effective illusion

Yes

Suppose it had been real

Well-- real things have happened in wars and so forth

They have, havenít they

Yes

Now. I will ask you to bit into this powerful substance

(The drug)

I donít want to

Of course not. But I insist

(done)Please

Please what

Please release me

Release you from what

Please release me

But nobody is restraining you

Thatís not true. I feel imprisoned

OK. Try getting out

(Pause)

Now Iím out, now I found the way out. How did I do that? How did I find the way out?

I want you to notice --a bedís been prepared

Iím ready for that bed-- that is, if I undress

Youíre even allowed to use it not getting undressed completely

Just the shoes, Iíd think

Yes. Take off the shoes

Well, maybe notThere is absolutely no place appropriate, for these many revelations to be as ravishing to my body and my persona as these revelations should be ravishing to me. Every part of my body should be effected

Try --

Try what

Iíll say it again and again and again, you stupid asshole--

A key should be inserted into something-- right? And happiness should be extracted from something-- am I right a second time?

Wait a minute. --After the key is turned?

After the key is turned, the key is removed

Does the door open

Yes

But the key is removed

Oh yes

(Pause)

Afterwards--Who hides the key

No one hides the key

Is it visible

Well, one carefully remembers its configuration

Strange-- I think these fingers--

Shhh

Should I hold just one of these to my lips

I donít think youíll be alowed to imitate the precise mechanism, but why not try

Shhh

(does it moving finger away during noise)

(Open door)

Was it already unlocked

Thatís not unlocked

(Points to chest on the floor)

Ah, but this item has a surprise Iíve already encountered

(Turns it over)

See? The bottom is missing

I still think itís locked

Yes it is, but I cam enter it

(down)

and exit. No problem

Oh, I think thereís a problem

Tell me

Thatís the problem

You canít tell me?

Itís so-- self evident, it canít be grasped

What

Hereís the key. I mean-- a key

What does this open

Just by accident, I donít know

Well, why donít I give it back to you

Itíll open practically anything

A skeleton key

(Pause)

Then Iíll save it for future usefulness--

No, use it now, if youíre going to use it

Then Iíll give it back to you

Iíll just-- hide it

(Done)

It opens practically anything

Yes

Iím glad you hid it

Now where did I put that key?

(Spins)Iíd like to be able to very fast, sometimes-- and sometimes not

Youíd cover a vast territory

(Pause, looks)

Am I where I started?

Well, you must have covered a vast territory

Where I started, moved, I think

Moved fast

Fast indeed if it isnít here now

Not yet

(Pause)

I can see weíre talking about the same pieces of funiture

I never had furniture I liked

How would you define having furniture

Iíd very quickly, make an inventory of my feelings

(Pause)

So. Times passes

And here we are

Yes. Deep into our furniture

This opens, I think

(Opens)

Careful-- what you take out is going to influence the rest of your life

No questions.

(Pause)

No questions?

Crown

Large hands

Stabbing oneís self with a knife

Blindfold

Cape

Eye-glasses

WingsIt is true that

daring to look round a corner

The visible

spills

into the tourturous

forget-me-nots of

I canít see it--

You canít see it--

Nobody sees it except that man in the black hat who stumbled on it quite by accidentIíll never forget this magical object

Well, --itís formless

No. It has a form, itís just . . .

Yes

A wad. A large wad of somethingIf I had something specific to talk about, I wouldnít be able to talk about whatís really important to me-- no, correct that-- whatís really important, which to me isnít, but it is important

So you have something to talk about after all

No. Iím in the process of erasing thatHere is a list of potent items

Crown

drum

hand

blimdfold

knife--

You favor physical objects over people

I favor not people, but what is inside people. And the potent physical objects I choose perform excevations on the inside of people

Oh?

You see? A brass trumpet would express your ëOhî in a way that would shake things as they are to their very foundations

Iíd like to be turned inside out

Would you?

Well, it was a momentary lust for something I probably canít handle

Crown

Stabbing oneself

Large hands

Blindfold

cape

eye glasses

wings

It is true that

daring to look around a corner

the visible

spills

into those torturous forget-me-nots

of I canít see it

I canít see it--

Nobody sees it except that man in the black hat who stumbled on it quite by accidentIíll never forget this magic object

Well, itís formless

No-- it has a form, itís just--

Yes

A wad. A large wad of somethingIf I had something specific to talk about-- then that would stop me from being able to talk about whatís really important to me-- no, correct that. Whatís really important, which to me isnít-- but it is important

So you have something to talk about after all

No. Iím in the process of erasing thatHere is a list of potent items

Crown

drum

hand

blindfold

knife

You favor physical objects over people

I favor not people, but what is inside people. And the potent physical objects I choose perform excevation on the inside of people.

Oh?

You see? A brass trumpet would experience your ìOhî in a way that would shake things as they are to the core.Thatís funny. I was just upstairs and I thought somebody was there

Where

Upstairs

You werenít upstairs

Oh yes I was

You were down here with me for hours

Hey, you must be dreaming, kitten, because I was upstaiors with you know who, setting personal matters in order, but now-- I donít know why-- I can just sense that you know who went up there but thereís no exit from up their except those stairs and I didnít see you know who, coming down those stairs

Who

You know who

Say it

Why should I say it when I know it causes you such pain, doll face.Somebodyís been lying to me about life

Everything is in response to pain. Emotional, physcial-- without pain, --nothing

Then maybe nothing is desirable

Yes. Nothing, is desirable. But of course, desire is a trap

(Pause)

Itís very easy to be negative

Oh? Nothing painful? did notice-- as I turned this particular corner-- I did notice-- Helene , or somebody like Hlene, emerging from a doorway and shutting the door behind her, then slaming her fist against the door, not as if she wanted to enter but as if placing the ërealí of her fist, embossed, onto the door itself

Well well well-- you can go up these stairs, you can go down thses stairs, These are things you can do in this room

* * *

What can I do in this room. I can go in and out the door.

Probably not.

I probably canít do that

Of course you can

No-- this going in and out of doors-- thatís something I camn only imagine

Well, it doesnít sound like fun, but you can certainly do it

How can I do something that isnít fun

When was the lAst time you had fun?

I canít remember

Then you must have done lots since then that wasnít so much fun

Did it ever occur to you that I have a bad memory

Ah, then you ARE having fun after all

Well, I was until a minute ago

What happened a minute ago

I realized it wasnít as much fun as I thought it was

What was

Whatever. Just. . . .waiting for something exciting to happen

(Pause)

Watch this

(Exits)The ground of things is going to write about itself on the inside of my head . I can feel it getting ready to happen

Oh?

I better not turn my head up looking for heaven

(Chop it off)

You no longer have tio write anything about what happens to you

What do you mean?

He left the room wearing rose colored glasses, didnít he?Am I being encouraged to follow you into the next room

No. Iím not going into the next room/.

Right, itís safer in here

Why, whatís the the next room.

One never knows

You must know

Am I here? Or in the next room. Then how would I know whatís in the next room. Should we find out together?

(Phone)

Ah, that could be the answer

How could that be the answer

Before you introduce yourself, know thereís a woman beside me here who expects much clarification from this telephone call--

I do not

(Puts it doen, rings again)

This means something-- what does it mean?

I donít know

It means one always gets a second chance.

(enter other)

Did you just cal us from the next room

I did notWhat I find unsettling is the way everything is turning into something else

Thatís exciting to me

Oh? Wherever I look-- a chair turns into a table. A door opening-- but really-- waving at me like a giant hand

Have some drugs.

My problem is-- words. My problem is the words I most want to use, the words that OBCESS me-- well, they do obcess me.

Here are some.

This is the cerimony of the great breaking of the head against hard stone.Why is it that I am not allowed to speak and manifest the things that are tearing me apart.

Why is it that no arena is manifest in which I can display my intelligence of fire amd mud and even hope for a hope for a hope for some semi-appropriate response

Why is it that my words can find not an articulatatble body that does this articulAtion into which they can be dropped to then produce the articulated explosion that is siezed by fire and crystalized by the ice that caiuses a tremendous burning sensation in the throat of all dreamed of articulees and articulatables

Why is it I have nohing but MYSELF! MYSELF! MYSELF, which is a vanity onlyNo. Donít present me with your body because thew lure of my own sweetness which is only articulatable in you and your limbs of overpowering fragrence and stench-- these, these-- returning me to myself makes of the loathsome mirror image an icon I can no more worship than I can worship my own death which I do the moment it becomes only imagining

Why do I imagine a man who says--The arugument produced by my intelligence is also-- an aproximation of the way that imtelligence hides itself.

There is much hiding of the intelligence

You ask why?

I ask why

When the intgelligence hides-- itís as if a fruit

were burried in the earth. So that later-- flowering, a whole tree is manifest; radient with blossems and new fruit, multiplied

Hiding, therefore, think of it as a kind of multiplication

OK. I hide this orange in the cabinet

That orange is not my intelligence-- but do you choose to make it stand in for my intelligence?

Would that be a smart move?

Ah, the flowering of that activity will or will not take place on some future occasion, linked to some futiure event we can guess at-- while being prepared also, for surprise.

(Fruit in cabinet)

Now. What have I donr with my intelligence?

(Enter girl)

Well-- say something

Lookmin the cabinet

(She looks in, takes out a plate)

Why did you chose the plate

Why did you remove anything, when all one said was ìLook in the cabinetî

I didnít know it was a command, I thought it was an invitation

This is not the intelligence at work.

I know. This is not the intelligence at workThe minute one speaks, one goes off the track, doesnít one

Writing is different, writing is better, but speaking inevitAbly produces in the voice, inflections which cheapen and vulgurize and limit the resonance of the thing which written, is closer to the unsayable which by definition, remains the unsaid

So. Never speak

Is that agreed upon? There will be no speakingA story is being told. The man or woman telling the story is holding flowers in his or her arms, a relic of sorts, of some time or epoch when the telling of stories was a telling of the truth about things

Now, however, this operates differently. The story being told hides in fact, the truth about many things, but in hiding that truth, that same truth about things is available in other ways, not trough the story being told, but by the things surrounding and containing even the story itself.

Such as the beautiful flowers, held by the man or woman teling the story

I am going to tell you a story.

I am going to tell you a story about certain men and women. And I am going to title this story--I come to the great ones

The oneís who do not smile

the ones who broke no compromise with the delicate center of things

delicate like rocks are delicate and iron is delicate

I come to those almost and not yet having been born ones

but I come bringing my own racus laughter

and my own vulgar pratfall, as the gift I shall lay on the table

of my adorable adoration for these great gray ancient ones whose company I belong to forever as outside and insider both--knowing neither the correct language not the correct drape of the tongue over the IMPORTANT WORDS

BUT KNOWING NEVERTHELESS

that I am at the center of their precarious thinking

the long moment I am opening the door to things that are still outside the trembling inner vestebule inside which thdere is only silence and holiness.What is hidden

What is hidden

What grows from hiding or being hidden.

What does not grow, really, unless it is well hidden

Being hidden, we do not know this thing

This is true enough

Anything not hidden from us, is used by us, mids, intelligence, consciousness-- uses what is not hidden from us.

Stroking itís surface again and again, wearing it down like a coin is worn down over time-- stroked again and again by fingers or intelligence or memory, til it withers and is defaced to the point of death and almost vanished.

But if it vanishes-- is that not a kind of hiding

(Pause)

I donít know yet

(Pause)

What is really hidden from us

Everything that isnít used by us, and therefore doesnít wither and vanish

So there is another kingdom, trembling, flourishing, hidden from us

Perhaps

I feel certain of thAt

Then the minute we locate it--

Yes

It withers

Yes

Because we use it. We think upon it, and handle it with our words and consciousnes and emotions

Yes

(Pause)

Does this other kingdom, which we can never reach but we begin to destroy it-- can this other kingdom nourish us?

Ah, this is an important question

(Pause)

Look out the window into the garden. I believe that when we water and nurture that garden, we are simultaniously, nourished by that kingdowm we do not see, that is hidden from us

Is it like a garden?

Yes. But we do not experience it

Does it feed the same garden we do see and do feed?

Yes. I believe that

But this has nomething to do with the real world

Correct