Gestating the writing process

The piece I'm gestating now has taught me that I don't write plays so much as give birth to them. And it frustrates me to no end. I am creatively bloated and sluggish, laden down with the play that's growing inside me, and there's absolutely nothing I can do about it besides feed it and wait. I have nearly no say in what comes out, no input as to when it will happen. I only feel the stirrings in the murky darkness of the metaphorical womb. It frightens me a bit.

It's eerie just how embodied my process is, how closely it parallels the cycles of my body. Most of the stuff I write, fertilized as it is, never takes root and gets ejected from my system like so much menstrual blood. The plays that take hold, the ones that eventually become my children made of words, often have difficult births. There is always pain because I am pushing out a truth I am not big enough to express, threatening to split me in two. With every piece, there is the fear that this is the one that will finally kill me. Yet once I'm in labor, I cannot desist. It must come out, even if I die afterwards.

And when it's over, I hold my baby of paper and pixels. Did I do this? Did this come from me? It can't be. It's wrinkly and slimy and more precious than anything in the world. I clean it off, make it look somewhat more human. I let it feed off my dreams and memories. I watch it grow.

Tulpa, or Anne&Me is a lively toddler now, having taken its first steps last year and progressed to running around. I am amazed by it even as I fear for its future, for the world I brought it into.

Pregnant again, I am waiting for the new piece to take shape, to tell me its name. I had my own ideas, but the play inside me rejected them. I remind myself to let go of trying to control it. Just feed it and wait. I am always hungry, and my cravings are strange.

I envy those with the gift of clarity. What is it like to create something as an act of will? What is it like to choose what comes out of you? To have a say in what and when and how? What is it like?

Blackboard Reading Series and Agent 99

Went to the Blackboard Reading Series last night. Had a blast, met some great actors, came away feeling vindicated about the opening scene of Anne&Me (still hoping for death threats).

And 99 Seats does not turn a discussion about theatre into a chest-thumping roar about how Scott doesn't know what he's talking about. To which I ask: Where's the fun in that?

Anne&Me - consolidating sources

One of the hardest things for me to do is talk about my work. Sure, I can write about it. I can think about it. But once I have to verbalize things on the fly, it gets hard for me. So I'm putting together what I've written about Anne & Me to make it a bit easier on myself.

Anne & Me
Text of the play. You can also e-mail me if you want a digital copy.

The conversations I want to have about Anne & Me
Self-explanatory, really.

Why I'm doing this
The motivation to keep at Anne & Me despite how hard it is for me. Notwithstanding the personal and painful experiences that compelled me to tackle this as a full-length piece, it's so hard to make this woman do some of the things she does in the play.

Personal demons - literally
Something to understand about Anne in Anne & Me.

Something I've been wondering about
Thinking about the "artistic" personality and how race, gender, and class play into it.

And more Japanese theatre!
Originally written for my currently abandoned play, but applicable to Anne & Me as well. Explains why Japanese theatre appeals to me so much, as well as what I try to include in my plays.

You can also find more by reading the stuff under the theater and writing tags.

New year, new work

During my social hibernation back in Richmond, I've been taking advantage of the time to read, reflect, and work on my most recent piece, Anne and Me. It's still a work in progress, but I hope to have a 2nd draft completed by the time I return to Brooklyn.

I do not know why I decided to post it on my LiveJournal instead of here. Maybe it felt gentler there, and I have more control over who can access and respond to it. Not to mention, I have a larger fan base (if you can call it that).

As for the other piece I was working on, I'm going to consider it deliberately unfinished for now. I really, really, really hate being the kind of writer who has yet another piece that's never going to get done, but I was simply swept up in something that initially began on a lark. I may return to that bit later, when I'm gripped by something as powerful as what gripped me to turn Anne and Me into an actual script.

And here is where I fantasize about being interviewed by James Lipton.

JAMES LIPTON: Where did you get the idea for Anne and Me?

RVCBARD: It started out as frustration. I'm pretty active in the anti-racist blogosphere, especially over at Stuff White People Do and my LiveJournal, Lair of the Dragon Lady. The racial discourse I frequently encountered was often draining, disappointing, and disheartening because the my comments and those of other Black women were generally: 1) taken way out of context - often beyond the point of hyperbole, 2) interpreted in the worst possible light, generally painting us as Angry Black Women, 3) regurgitated many of the same cliche arguments to the point that you could play Bingo with them, and 4) insulted our intelligence, undermined our dignity, and made us question our sanity.

I've written thousands of words about the subject of racism, particularly as experienced by Black women. I've been tactful, caustic, intellectual, emotional, deferential, authoritative, honest, evasive, and just about any other adjective you could use to describe a way to get a message across. Almost inevitably, some White people completely miss my point, don't even realize it, and proceed to display that for all to see with the tacit or vocal approval of others.

For some reason, I was thinking about what it felt like to be a Black woman. At the time, I remember asking myself, "Why not write it as a scene?" Soon after I did that, I wrote another one, and it grew from there. They were not written in any kind of order. I wasn't concerned about plot or anything. I just needed a way to get my thoughts down without being burdened by rhetorical prose. Some of the feedback I'd received revealed that I was touching on something really powerful, so I used that as encouragement to see where the idea would take me.

JAMES LIPTON: Why Anne Hathaway?

RVCBARD: Why not? Simply put, I like her. I've been fascinated with her work for a while. I tend to get pretty intense when someone captures my imagination, which usually means I find out as much as I can about them. I don't mean celebrity gossip; I'm frankly not interested in that kind of thing, but I do try to get a sense of who they are as a person outside the image presented to the public. Not in any kind of invasive way, just very focused and deliberate. So casting her as an "imaginary friend" felt very natural.

JAMES LIPTON: Have you met her?

RVCBARD: No, but a couple of my online friends did. They told me she was very nice. She might not be nice to me if she reads Anne and Me though, but I feel like I'm working on something important enough to disregard my fear of rejection and humiliation.

JAMES LIPTON: How has writing Anne and Me changed your ideas about your writing?

RVCBARD: Before I really started working on Anne and Me, I was one of those artists who believed that theater should never be sullied by something as sordid as politics. I saw political engagement as the enemy of art, but I now realize that what I truly objected to was politics divorced from experience and presented as art. What bothered me was people saying nothing very loudly. In so many words, it's not the idea I objected to so much as the execution. Suffice it to say, I simply never came across many political pieces that appealed to me.

I was practically allergic to "identity theater" - theater that is about being Black, being a woman, being gay, etc. There's this strange paradox always hanging over "identity plays." The people who most needed to see it wouldn't, and the people who saw it already got it. So how do you go about getting the message to the people who need it and avoiding redundancy with the people who do? I don't pretend to have any answers for this, but it's just one of the thoughts that bubbled just beneath my consciousness.

JAMES LIPTON: Do you have any plans for producing Anne and Me?

RVCBARD: Not at the moment. To be honest, I'm scared to. Less than because it's likely to flop and more because of the distant chance it would succeed. It might be better to wait until after I'm dead, but by then I doubt it would be relevant anymore. It's a tough call, and I do not envy the person who would have to run the show. Unless Anne Hathaway produces and performs in it, in which case I'd feel a lot more comfortable.

JAMES LIPTON: Sounds like a dream come true.

RVCBARD: It could be.

Breakthrough (aka All About My Grandmother)

One of the struggles I've had with my play so far is making Orixa interesting. In a movement-based piece, you can't rely on witticisms and other verbal tricks. It's hard to convey quirkiness in a play filled with spirits, demons, ghosts, and other beings.

At first, I was kicking and screaming against the idea that my character had to want something, had to be a personality at all.

But as I was working on the play, I had a revelation. It started as I was sitting in the Lincoln Center Barnes & Noble reading Jeffrey Sweet's The Dramatist's Toolkit. In it, he cautioned against making characters too autobiographical. "Change it up!" he says, in so many words. "A different age, different gender, different social class - find at least one way to make the character not like you!"

I resisted the notion at first, for several reasons. First of all, as each play is my own creation, there's nothing in it that's truly outside of me. And even when you do reach a point beyond yourself, you're still the starting point. Second of all, the idea sort of struck me as coming from a privileged perspective. It's easy enough to apply when you're dealing with a demographic that dominates today's theater landscape - but when it comes to authors whose voices are typically marginalized, it's a little bit harder to justify taking that advice full-stop.

But my resistance faltered as I was eating breakfast today and I suddenly - like out of the blue - thought about my grandmother. And I had so many questions! What was Grandma like? Not the Grandma I grew up with, but the one who raised my mother, aunt, and uncles? How did she see and interact with the world? These questions hounded me so much that I called Mom on her job to ask them.

The conversation was revealing in itself, but now I've solved my main problem with this play: I didn't know anything about my main character. As a result, everything seemed generic and nebulous. While what I had was imaginative and potentially very interesting, there was no visceral, emotional connection to it because it wasn't rooted in something concrete for me. So everything I wrote felt bland, trite, and meaningless.

All the feelings surrounding my relationship with Grandma - the joy of recognition, the sorrow at parting, the regret for things unsaid, the yearning to reestablish a connection, the love that needs no words, the humbling respect for a remarkable human being - suddenly surged and bubbled up to the surface, and it's so overwhelming I'm almost crying.

I now know who Orixa is. And her name is/was - Linda Ray Thacker.

Flowcharts rule!

That's all I have to say, really. But to make it more pertinent . . .

I'm really digging the non-linear format. It lets me note simultaneous action and offer choices to everyone without having to spell it all out in "chronological" order (which means actors, directors, designers, etc. have to hunt down the information instead of just see the parts that apply to them). With all the shapeshifting and transformations that happen in the story, it makes it a lot easier to keep track of things.

Of course, I'll probably have to submit to standard script format eventually - which I'll likely do kicking and screaming. But at least I'm putting up some resistance.

After the first full draft is hammered out, I'll probably invest in some index cards.

But that probably means I won't be able to let you be as close to the process as you were earlier. :(

BTW, I'm now involved in a playwrights' group called Playsmiths. This ain't your Too Cool For You type of group, for which I'm thankful. I won't pimp them too hard, but if there are actors and directors who want to work on interesting new work. Did I mention interesting and new? Oh, I did? Well let me remind you again. These are new works by new playwrights that are really fucking interesting. None of the American Family in Crisis crap. No Theatre of the Great White Man. And definitely no motherfucking Broadway revivals of popular (and often mediocre) films! So . . . No Transformers: The Musical. No Pirates of the Caribbean: Beating the Dead Horse. No Matrix: Regurgitations. OK, there are occasionally talking animals, but nothing ripping off Disney.

So if you're in New York City during the weekends, shoot me an e-mail or reply to this post if you want to get involved.

I miss words now

I've been wrestling with this piece for a few months now, probably closer to a year, and I can't seem to progress, only write in circles.

In the meantime, I've been neglecting some other stories I wanted to work with, stories that use - gasp! - dialogue.

I feel that right now, my persistence is working against this piece. Perhaps I'm just not ready for this play yet, and I need time to work on other things first. Rather than force the play through (which results in the play feeling forced), I'm going to set it aside and come back to it later, when there's something I feel compelled to write with it. Then at least I'll be working with something real instead of something I squeezed from my brain out of sheer determination.

So don't be surprised if the next bit of writing is a bit different.

Fairy tale gumbo

It just came to my attention that there is a real-world equivalent for the world I'm creating with my play: the Louisiana bayou. I have to admit that I do associate that environment with a certain magic. And there's the gumbo of influences to consider too: Voodoo, Yoruba, European fairy tales, and Japanese theater. If I think about it, it's pretty Creole. Even the environments I envision have a sort of swampyness to it. Tangled roots, overhanging branches, rich black earth, owls, outlines of strange creatures (a dog? a wolf?), shadows slinking through the water (an alligator? a water monster?), weird lights, and so on.

Dreams and panels

Apparently the panel thing works as far as getting my script from Point A to Point B. But I have to admit I'm still apprehensive. Is this enough to work with? Are the aesthetic qualities clear? Do the scenes strike you as complete narratives in and of themselves, or do they need "help"?

For example, in this scene (Panel 5), I write:

Is that enough to hinge a performance on? Do I need to say more about the quality of movement? I admit that some of this may be me trying to make my script actor-proof or director-proof, but . . . like I said, I'm not sure.

I suppose I'm second-guessing the relative simplicity of the text. I feel like I'm leaving out so much that I want to put in there. And I feel like I'm expecting collaborators to "complete" my script instead of giving them something that's complete to begin with.

I don't know. Actors? Directors?

Is there anybody out there willing to help me out with this?

Third dream

PANEL 1
WITCH leading child-Orixa, who has very long dreads, into glade.

PANEL 2
STONES falling into place as a tower.

PANEL 3
Tower growing as Orixa grows.

PANEL 4
Stones transforming into VOODOO DOLLS.

PANEL 5
Witch manipulating dolls to good or bad fortune.

PANEL 6
Dolls changing into PEOPLE who prosper or suffer according to Witch's actions.

PANEL 7
Orixa examining dolls.

PANEL 8
Witch transforming into an owl and flying out, leaving behind her comb.

PANEL 9
Orixa picking up comb and examining it.

PANEL 10
Orixa making Voodoo Doll as Witch.

PANEL 11
Orixa thinking deeply.

PANEL 12
Orixa stabbing doll with red pin or needle.

PANEL 13
Witch returning as wounded owl, perhaps shot with a hunter's arrow.

PANEL 14
Witch changing back into human form.

PANEL 15
Orixa and Witch looking at each other.

PANEL 16
Witch grabbing Orixa and hacking off her hair.

PANEL 17
Orixa jumping from tower.

PANEL 18
Stones transforming into BRIARS as Orixa falls.

PANEL 19
Briars becoming TREES as Orixa wanders, blind.

PANEL 20
Orixa coming to a fallow clearing.

PANEL 21
Orixa planting seeds.

PANEL 22
Seeds growing into garden of lush RAPUNZEL lettuces or cabbages.

PANEL 23
Orixa tending to garden.

PANEL 24
PEASANT sneaking into garden and taking a few rapunzels.

Second dream

Moving right along . . .

PANEL 1
Briars change into TREES.

PANEL 2
Orixa as Red Riding Hood walking along a path.

PANEL 3
Orixa veering off path.

PANEL 4
Trees rearranging themselves.

PANEL 5
Orixa lost in wilderness.

PANEL 6
Trees changing into ZOMBIES.

PANEL 7
Zombies chasing Orixa.

PANEL 8
Orixa arriving at Grandmother's house.

PANEL 9
GRANDMOTHER feeding Orixa minced meat pie.

PANEL 10
Orixa finding human finger bone.

PANEL 11
Orixa looking for Grandmother.

PANEL 12
Orixa finding wolf pelt.

PANEL 13
Orixa in Grandmother's bedroom.

PANEL 14
Grandmother dressing Orixa in pelt.

PANEL 15
Orixa transforming into wolf.

PANEL 16
Orixa devouring Grandmother.

PANEL 17
Orixa eating minced meat pie.

First dream

I'll go by what I said in the comments of this post to see how it works. Instead of writing scenes as such, I created something more like comic book panels. Being without a scanner or digital camera, it's not possible for me to upload pictures. And I won't even both trying to draw anything using a mouse.

I don't know. It feels scant. Is it enough to base a performance on?

PANEL 1
ORIXA wandering in a dense fog.

PANEL 2
ANANSI in the form of an old woman coming along.

PANEL 3
Orixa and Anansi sharing a cigar (or perhaps some other substance stuffed in a cigar) and rum.

PANEL 4
Anansi transforming into a spider.

PANEL 5
Anansi weaving cloth from night sky.

PANEL 6
Anansi wrapping Orixa in cloth.

PANEL 7
Orixa tossing and turning as she sleeps.

PANEL 8
BRIARS growing around Orixa.

I wrote a scene! (Snow White)

(Note: This part of the play continues from the Rapunzel portion. Like the red cloak going from Sleeping Beauty to Red Riding Hood, I'm imagining the mirror somehow transferring from Rapunzel. This may change later, though.)

We are mirrors in the queen's private rooms, watching and judging all. The place has an air of decayed splendor.

There is a magic MIRROR that is a statue of perfect beauty - tall, thin, and pale with dark hair and blood red lips. It wears a Mona Lisa expression and holds a mirror in its hands. Despite its beauty, there's something creepy about it - as if, when we gaze at it, it gazes back and finds what it sees ugly or pathetic.

Orixa paces, fresh from a bath. She is now approaching menopause, but there remains an elegance to her. She examines herself in the magic mirror. Notices crows' feet at her eyes and brow, wrinkles on her mouth, stray gray strands of hair (all of which maybe only she can see).

SNOW WHITE enters as if going inside a secret chamber within a temple. She bears an eerie resemblance to the magic mirror.

[Mood music: The Velvet Underground, "Venus in Furs"]

Snow White dresses Orixa, applies her make-up (a face mask, perhaps?), and does her hair. There is something erotic about how reverent and meticulous she is. This is no chore, but a kind of liturgy. She may even sneak kisses onto Orixa's feet and hands.

Meanwhile, Orixa struggles to keep her regal reserve and avoid looking at Snow White. Snow White places a crown on her head. Orixa now resembles a kabuki dominatrix - a terrible beauty with clothes for armor and make-up as war paint.

Orixa admires herself in the magic mirror. The mirror gives an approving nod. It could even glance at Snow White.

Orixa notices Snow White waiting with neck bared. Considers. Pounces on Snow White, bites, and gorges on her blood. Holds Snow White in fierce, predatory embrace as Snow White clings to her (may even shiver and cry out in ecstasy). Orixa tears away. Harshly dismisses Snow White.

[Mood music: Bauhaus, "Bela Lugosi's Dead"]

Orixa allows the blood of youth and life to flow into her, invigorating her. Marvels at the breath coming from her lungs, the heart beating in her chest. All her earlier coldness melts away as she succumbs to rapture. Dances for joy - free, expressive, graceful.

When the magic fades, Orixa literally tries to hold on to it. She fails.

What does it mean? What does it MEAN?!

Why are we so reluctant to discuss the meaning of our work?

We have conversations about the meanings of art all the time while making it and yet... we get reluctant to share these conversations with our audiences.

Some of this reluctance is understandable to me. You don't want to dominate someone's understanding of the work, and culturally we are trained to accept an artists' interpretation of their own work as paramount. Also, audiences/viewers can themselves chafe at the dominance of the artists' viewpoint. I am particularly hostile to directors notes that tell me how to feel think and respond to what I'm about to see. But surely there's a difference between telling someone before they see something how they should respond to it and discussing it with them, right?

Which gets me back to an old saw, one i deploy all the time and I see my fellow artists deploy: I want to make art that asks interesting/difficult/meaningful questions rather than giving answers. Which is something I do agree with, but at the same time as artists, certainly we come up with at least a few answers to the questions posed by the work we do, even if we don't put those answers into the work itself.

I think the sticky wicket is this: How do we discuss our own interpretation of a work in a way that invites others into the dialogue, to have their own interpretations of it, to approach it in their own way and derive meaning from it, even if we (strongly) disagree with their interpretations or the meaning they derive from it? How do we lead those conversations? How do we use our expertise (we are experts in our own art, after all) without becoming dominant authorities?

Oh, just load it up while you're at it, why don'tcha, Isaac?

If I'm quite honest with myself, my reluctance to talk about meaning in my work is simple - I really don't know.

There, I said it.

I don't know what my work means. If I did, I'd rather just write an essay or something and get right to the point instead of dancing around it and being deliberately obtuse.

But the fact of the matter is I'm more interested in creating an experience instead of choosing or laying out an interpretive thrust for the play. To be frank, that's why I write for theater. I know I'm supposed to spend my energy on story and character and what not, but I'm afraid that's just not what I do.

This current play attempts to create a sense of enchantment - a sense or intuition of a deeper, richer reality than is apparent on the surface. It's a pretty nuanced thing to go for, so I'm not sure if I'm explaining it right. But there it is.

Dead end play?

I don't know why, but I can't progress with this play. I keep redoing the same scene(s) over and over, and I can't quite move forward. It's not like I don't have ideas. I just can't get them on paper. And I'm thinking about another script I want to start on too (film?).

I don't know what to do. I could try to sludge through this, and I'm constantly berating myself for not gaining more ground. But it's just - stuck. What's going on here?

Scene in progress (pt 2)

Orixa awakens weeping, trembling, whimpering in . . .

A room in Grandmother's house. Dark, intimate, like a cave or womb or tomb. We are CATS watching from the shadows.

GRANDMOTHER rushes to help. Comforts Orixa. Calms her fears while Orixa clings to her. Brings Orixa a slice of minced meat pie*.

Orixa notices something strange about Grandmother's eyes (a bit larger than usual? Maybe just the shadows playing on Grandmother's face). Grandmother soothes Orixa while Orixa eats the pie. Gentle pats, strokes, scratches - almost as though Orixa is canine. Orixa notices something weird about Grandmother's hands (too big? Slightly clawed? Maybe Grandmother just hasn't clipped her nails in a while). Grandmother gives Orixa a maternal kiss. Orixa wolfs down the pie. Nearly chokes. Coughs up something (What the - ?). It's a human finger bone.

Orixa sits limply, staring at Grandmother. Recoils when Grandmother reaches to discard the bone. Stares at Grandmother in mute horror. Grandmother closes the distance. Coaxes Orixa out of cloak. Hugs Orixa close - tender, protective, soothing.

Gently leads Orixa to a dark spot amidst the cats (ie, us). Takes out a wolfskin. Shows it to Orixa. See? Harmless. Urges her to try it on. Orixa refuses. Grandmother dons wolfskin. Transforms into a huge WOLF. Shift is fluid, natural as breathing. Not so much a real wolf as the spirit of night - shadows and moonlight and mist - taking wolf form. During transformation, Orixa retreats. Notices shears. Stealthily picks them up and hides them.

Wolf approaches, almost gliding to her. Extends a hand/paw to Orixa, a silent invitation to be part of this magic. Orixa hesitates. Accepts. Wolf pulls Orixa close. Inhales her scent. Gives her an affectionate lick. Orixa lets Wolf hold her close, keeping her warm (Much better than that ratty old cloak, isn't it, dear?).

Orixa musters all her strength and courage. Stabs Wolf. Wolf falls upon Orixa, dead. Orixa slips from Wolf. A pregnant pause. Orixa uses shears to remove the Wolf's pelt. Grandmother - human Grandmother - lies beneath. Orixa caresses Grandmother one last time. Takes wolfskin off her. Holds wolfskin close while gazing at Grandmother. Changes into wolf. Transformation slow and painful as bones, joints, skin stretch and contort into shape. Metamorphosis complete, Orixa devours Grandmother's flesh. Flees to . . .

TBC . . .

Note: During Witch Hunting Times (my moniker), it was believed that witches could transform into wolves by putting on wolf skins.

Note 2: In one telling of Red Riding Hood, the wolf gets Red Riding Hood to eat some of Granny's flesh (unbeknownst to Red Riding Hood).

Scene in progress (pt 1)

Orixa dons the cloak*, becoming Red Riding Hood as the dreamscape changes to . . .

A deep in dense forest. Twilight. We are TREES in wilderness, silent witnesses to what's to come. Strange SHADOWS pass through the woods, watching and following Orixa as she wanders helplessly. Something malevolent, predatory about them.

Orixa walks along a path through the trees (ie, us). Absently grazes leaves and branches, perhaps plucks off a few twigs or picks up a few things from the forest floor. Notices something glimmering just off the path. Hesitates a moment. Pursues the shining and finds a pair of polished shears. Examines them carefully, tests their sharpness on a stray twig before pocketing them.

Night falls.

Orixa tries to return to path but can't find it. Tears through trees (ie, us), frantically searching for signs of her passing - tracks, broken branches, the positions of the stars, anything - but finds none.

Orixa stumbles upon a small glade. Catches her breath. In the darkness, Orixa notices baleful red eyes gleaming like bicycle lights. She takes out shears. Sees something horrible in the shadows. Drops shears and runs as fast as she can.

Shadows swoop upon Orixa. Orixa screams, faints. Blackout.

TBC . . .

*Note: In the previous scene (the one in my head, not the one on paper), I imagined the old woman (or rather, the fairy in disguise) to have been weaving a blood red cloak.

Music for my play

Here's a little taste of the kind of music that fits my play.

Nice and macabre, just like I like it.

Act 4, Scene 4

[Mood music: Dead Can Dance - "The Lotus Eaters"]

With the loving cruelty of a dominatrix, Seraph tears away all traces of Orixa's mundane self piece by piece. Orixa resists as though Seraph skins her alive, trying to shield herself. but Seraph persists. They writhe intertwined like two snakes on a caduceus - intimate, graceful, hypnotic. Seraph strokes and kisses and licks away Orixa's pain and injury, healing the wounds even as they are made. Orixa surrenders, allowing Seraph to strip away the last vestiges of her human form.

The seed of Orixa's being is naked. Seraph comforts her.

[Mood music: Danzig - "Her Black Wings"]

Seraph adorns Orixa with a gown like the midnight sky, glorious black wings, and a halo like a crown of golden thorns. Orixa flows into her new form like blood flows through veins. Seraph gently guides her with the fluid grace of a swimming snake, caressing and kissing and licking each part of Orixa as it assumes its new shape. Orixa is now an angel of night and dreams.

Seraph marvels at her. Orixa stretches her wings. Together they fly out of our world into the Words Beyond.

A Kick in the Pants

Over on my Etude 4 - Practical example post, Laura said:

You know what I think? I think this needs to be experienced. In this show I was watching last night, the performer told a story about how she looked out of her window and saw a rainbow that in its particular setting was so shockingly beautiful that it took her breath away, and her automatic reaction was to rush around the house trying to get a camera and take a photo of it. And when she finally found the camera, and the batteries for the camera, and pointed it at the sky, the rainbow was gone. And she had tried so hard to capture and hold onto it (when a photo would never have really been the same, anyway) that she missed the opportunity to experience it. And I thought, what a beautiful metaphor for theatre. You can't ever capture it and save it for later. It is in the moment of communion between the artists and the audience. This is what I think of when I read your work. It is intriguing and haunting, but I imagine I could never really, truly "get" it just by reading it. I want to experience it instead. Your work is clearly meant for nothing so much as experience. So there's your task, my friend. I plan to visit friends in NYC in late Feb. Think you can get up a show by then? :)

So it's official. I need to have this written, cast, rehearsed, and ready for performance by late February. So it looks like I'll actually get a world premiere.

Anybody in the NYC area who can put me in touch with actors/dancers who want to work on a movement-oriented piece?