Tag: drama

Bread

And the heart of the matter.

They come to see us, hungry for our size.

Look at our faces. We tower. They dance.

One says, walk slower. One says, closer.

There are more of us now, as though prayers.

Into clouds. No command is needed from this height.

They sing us. A dirge, they sing for beloveds

and the birds call back. From their ovens,

the smell of bread. When they taste,

they will look. Up, they will see us,

our suspended faces

against sky. 

***

Inspired by a recent New York Times article about Peter Schumann’s Bread and Puppet Theater.

Specific Ambiguity

With Jon Fosse.

There is a possibility, when planning a scene, of doing nothing. Of taking time, as the saying goes. Besides, something always happens anyway because with nothing to do, it’s all breath and questions, both of which are loaded.

With no buffer between a life and a sense of scale and scope, every exchange is weighted, too. There you are, lover. I see you, strange stranger. Strip it down enough, and you are left with a fierce poetic sensibility.

With space enough for reflection, everything is linked: death, the living, and the tension of seeming opposites. With so many unknowns, held at the boiling point, you get a very specific ambiguity, and if there was a point you were meaning to make about the nature of communication between us, perhaps it is only this. 

Yes, it has always been this complicated.

***

Inspired by (and with borrowed phrases from) this article by Sarah Cameron Sunde on the plays of Jon Fosse.