Monologues for Women
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MONOLOGUES WOMEN
This Is Our Youth- Kenneth Lonergan
JESSICA: Well…OK…It’s just– This is getting a little weird now, because when I talked to
Valerie, she asked me if anything happened with us last night, and for some reason, I guess I
didn’t really tell her that anything did. So now she’s gonna talk to Dennis and I’m gonna look
like a total liar to someone I’m just starting to be close friends with and who I really care about!
But honestly, Warren? I really don’t care who you told, or what you told them, because people
are gonna think whatever they think and you know what? There’s nothing I can do about it. I
should just really listen to my instincts, you know? Because your instincts are never wrong. And
it was totally against my instinct to come over here last night, and it was definitely against my
instinct to sleep with you, but I did and it’s too late. And now my Mom is totally furious at me, I
probably ruined my friendship with Valerie, and now like Dennis thinks I’m like easy pickings
or something! And it’s not like I even care what he thinks, OK? Because I don’t actually know
him. Or you. Or Valerie for that matter! So it really doesn’t matter! I’ve made new friends before
and I can make more new friends now if I have to. So let’s forget the whole thing ever
happened,
you can chalk one up in your book, or whatever– and I’ll just know better next time! Hopefully.
OK?
Proof- David Auburn
CATHERINE: I lived with him. I spent my life with him. I fed him. Talked to him. Tried to
listen when he talked. Talked to people who weren’t there . . . Watched him shuffling around like
a ghost. A very smelly ghost. He was filthy. I had to make sure he bathed. My own father . . .
After my mother died it was just me here. I tried to keep him happy no matter what idiotic
project he was doing. He used to read all day. He kept demanding more and more books. I took
them out of the library by the carload. We had hundreds upstairs. Then I realized he wasn’t
reading: he believed aliens were sending him messages through the Dewey decimal numbers
on the library books. He was trying to work out the code . . .
Beautiful mathematics. The most elegant proofs, perfect proofs, proofs like music . . .
Plus fashion tips, knock-knock jokes– I mean it was nuts, OK?
Later the writing phase: scribbling nineteen, twenty hours a day . . . I ordered him a case of
notebooks and he used every one. I dropped out of school . . . I’m glad he’s dead.
Snakebit- David Marshall Grant
JENIFER: I don’t want to be an actress. I hate acting. I’ve always hated acting. It fills me with
nothing but self-loathing. There, I said it. And, you know, you do your affirmations, you know,
your prayers, that you’ll be like, you know, so filled with self-love that all that won’t matter.
What am I saying? The whole thing’s a joke. You know why I don’t want to act? And don’t tell
Jonathon this. I’ve never told anybody this. I started to stutter. On stage. Can you believe that?
Honestly. I would get to a word in the script, and when I came to it, I wouldn’t be able to say it. I
would freeze. Every time I would get to it. I couldn’t get it out. I get fixated on a word. Last time,
I was playing the blind Mexican flower vendor in Streetcar Named Desire. Don’t ask me why.
And all I had to do was say, “Flores para los muertos.” There, I said it now. “Flores para los
muertos.” I had nothing else to say, just that. I sat around waiting all night. “Flores para los
muertos. Flores para los muertos.” I couldn’t say it. Now I can say it. It’s pathetic. Muertos. I
couldn’t say muertos. It wouldn’t come out. I ended up saying, “Flores para los dead people.”
Blanche DuBois accused me of sabotaging her performance. All she wanted me to do was to
say the line right. That’s what I was not getting paid to do. And Jonathon made me feel so… You
know, why don’t I just leave him? I really should just leave him.
Spike Heels-Theresa Rebeck
LYDIA: I don’t know you. You and I have never met. And you are wreaking havoc on my life.
At first, I admired Andrew’s interest in your welfare. He cares about people; he truly cares and I
think that’s wonderful. But these past few months, I must admit, I have become less interested
in his interest. Not only do I listen to him talk about you incessantly, any time I come over to
have dinner or spend the night here, I am bombarded by you. When you come home at night,
we hear your little heels clicking on the ceiling. When you leave in the morning, we hear your
little heels. When you go to bed we hear you brush your teeth and talk on the phone, and listen
to the radio and on certain evenings I could swear that we can even hear you undress. I am not
enjoying this. For the past two months, I have been under the distinct impression that any time I
spend the night here, I am actually sleeping with two people- Andrew, and yourself. In fact,
when you came home with Edward tonight my first thought was, my God, the bed is already
crowded enough; now we have to fit Edward in too? Now. I don’t know what went on between
you and Andrew. I want you out of my life! Is that understood?
Spike Heels-Theresa Rebeck
GEORGIE: I understand you all right. This part, I think I got down solid. But what I don’t have,
you know- what I want to know is- if you’re so fucking real, Lydia, then what the hell are you
doing here? I mean, if you’re so much better than me, then why even bother? You could just
wait it out and I’ll drift away like a piece of paper, like nothing, right? ‘Cause that’s what I am.
Nothing. Right? So why the fuck are you up here, taking me apart? What an amazing fucking
now job you are all doing on the world. And I bought it! We all buy it. My family- they’re like,
all of a sudden I’m Mary Tyler Moore or something. I mean, they live in hell, right, and they
spend their whole lives just wishing they were somewhere else, wishing they were rich, or sober,
or clean; living on a street with trees, being on some fucking TV show. And I did it. I moved to
Boston. I work in a law office, I’m the big success story. And they have no idea what that means.
It means I get to hang out with a bunch of lunatics. It means I get to read books that make no
sense. It means that instead of getting harassed by jerks at the local bar, now I get harassed by
guys in suits. Guys with glasses. Guys who talk nice. Guys in suits. Well, you know what I have
to say to all of you? Shame on you. Shame on you for thinking you’re better than the rest of us.
And shame on you for being mean to me. Shame on you, Lydia.
Spike Heels-Theresa Rebeck
GEORGIE: Yeah, right, he “gave” me the damn job. I fucking work my ass off for that jerk; he
doesn’t give me shit. I earn it, you know? He “gave” me the job. I just love that. What does that
mean, that I should be working at McDonald’s or something, that’s what I really deserve or
something? Bullshit. Fuck you, that is such fucking bullshit. You think I don’t know how to
behave in public or something?
Shit, I was a goddamn waitress for seven years, the customers fucking loved me. You
think I talk like this in front of strangers; you think I don’t have a brain in my head or
something? That is so fucking condescending. Anytime I lose my temper, I’m crazy, is that it?
You don’t know why I threw that pencil, you just assume. You just make these assumptions.
Well, fuck you, Andrew. I mean it. Fuck you.
I mean, I just love that. You don’t even know. You’ve never seen me in that office. You
think I’m like, incapable of acting like somebody I’m not? For four months I’ve been scared to
death but I do it, you know. I take messages, I call the court, I write his damn letters. I watch my
mouth, I dress like this– whatever this is; these are the ugliest clothes I have ever seen– I am
gracious, I am bright, I am promising. I am being this other person for them because I do want
this job but there is a point beyond which I will not be fucked with! So you finally push me
beyond that point, and I throw the pencil and now you’re going to tell me that that is my
problem? What, do you guys think you hold all the cards or something? You think you have the
last word on reality? You do, you think that anything you do to me is okay, and anything I do is
fucked because I’m not using the right words. I’m, like, throwing pencils and saying fuck you,
I’m speaking another language, that’s my problem. And the thing is– I am America. You know?
You guys are not America. You think you are; Fuck, you guys think you own the world. I
mean, who made up these rules, Andrew? And do you actually think we’re buying it?
Cocktails at Pam’s- Stewart Lemoine
ESTELLE: No, I don’t. I hate it. Actually, do you want to know what I really hate? I hate the fact
that although I despise green pepper, everyone else alive seems to love it. I mean, it really
doesn’t bother me so much that I don’t like the taste, because the reasons for that are certainly
scientific or medical. No, what bothers me is that everyone else likes it and because they do, it
is so much in evidence. On pizza, in salads….The other night I found some in stroganoff!
Oh….yuck… And a myth has sprung up you know. People have said to me, “Well, if you don’t
like it just pick it out.” But that’s so stupid. Just because you pick it out doesn’t mean the flavor’s
going to go away. Green pepper doesn’t work like that. It is insidious and pervasive, like noxious
fumes that kill you and your family while you sleep. Jesus, the way some people talk, you’d think
it was parsley! I’ve even seen, yes it’s true, green pepper that’s been sliced cross-wise to make
a sort of shamrock shaped ring. That’s supposed to be decorative. Do you believe it? That’s like
making a garnish to make the bile really rise up in the throats of your dinner guests!
(Estelle looks at the others who are standing quite motionless)
Look, I know you all like green pepper and so you think I’m over-reacting. But what I’m
trying to say is that acceptance of these foodstuffs can never be taken for granted. You can’t
assume it. It’s not a given. No. This is something that has caused me a lot of unhappiness and I
just don’t want to go through that anymore…………….I do like red pepper though. I want you all to
know that.
Oleanna- David Mamet
CAROL: The issue here is not what I “feel.” It is not my “feelings,” but the feelings of women.
And men. Your superiors, who’ve been “polled,” do you see? To whom evidence has been
presented, and who have ruled, do you see? Who have weighed the testimony and the
evidence, and have ruled, do you see? That you are negligent. That you are guilty, that you are
found wanting, and in error; and are not, for the reasons so-told, to be given tenure. That you
are to be disciplined. For facts. For facts. Not “alleged,” what is the word? But proved. Do you
see? By your own actions. That is what the tenure committee has said. That is what my lawyer
said. For what you did in class. For what you did in this office. They’re going to discharge you.
As full well they should. You don’t understand? You’re angry? What has led you to this place?
Not your sex. Not your race. Not your class. YOUR OWN ACTIONS. And you’re angry.
You ask me here. What do you want? You want to “charm” me. You want to “convince” me.
You want me to recant. I will not recant. Why should I…? What I say is right. You tell me, you
are going to tell me that you have a wife and child. You are going to say that you have a career
and that you’ve worked for twenty years for this. Do you know what you’ve worked for? Power.
For power. Do you understand? And you sit there, and you tell me stories. About your house,
about all the private schools, and about privilege, and how you are entitled. To buy, to spend,
to mock, to summon. All your stories. All your silly weak guilt, it’s all about privilege; and you
won’t know it. Don’t you see? You worked for twenty years for the right to insult me. And you
feel entitled to be paid for it.
Oleanna- David Mamet
CAROL: Why do you hate me? Because you think me wrong? No. Because I have, you think,
power over you. Listen to me. Listen to me, Professor (pause) It is the power that you hate. So
deeply that, that any atmosphere of free discussion is impossible. It’s not unlikely. It’s
impossible. Isn’t it? Now. The thing which you find so cruel is the selfsame process of selection
I, and my group, go through every day of our lives. In admittance to school. In our tests, in our
class rankings Is it unfair? I can’t tell you. But, if it is fair. Or even if it is unfortunate but
necessary for us, then, by God, so must it be for you. (pause) You write of your responsibility to
the young. Treat us with respect, and that will show you your responsibility. You write that
education is just hazing. (pause) But we worked to get to this school. (pause) And some of us.
(pause) Overcame prejudices. Economic, sexual, you cannot begin to imagine. And endured
humiliations I pray that you and those you love never will encounter. (pause) To gain admittance
here. To pursue that same dream of security you pursue. We, who, who are, at any moment, in
danger of being deprived of it. By the administration. By the teachers. By you. By, say, one low
grade, that keeps us out of graduate school; by one, say, one capricious or inventive answer on
our parts, which, perhaps, you don t find amusing. Now you know, do you see? What it is to be
subject to that power. Who do you think I am? To come here and be taken in by a smile. You
little yapping fool. You think I want revenge. I don’t want revenge. I WANT
UNDERSTANDING.
Wit- Margaret Edson
DR. VIVIAN BEARING: That certainly was a maudlin display. Popsicles? “Sweetheart”?
I can’t believe my life has become so…corny.
But it can’t be helped. I don’t see any other way. We are discovering
life and death, and not in the abstract, either; we are discussing my
life and my death, and my brain is dulling, and poor Susie’s was never
very strong to begin with, and I can’t conceive of any other…tone.
(Quickly) Now is not the time for verbal swordplay, for unlikely
flights of imagination and wildly shifting perspectives, for
metaphysical conceit, for wit.
And nothing would be worse than a detailed scholarly analysis.
Erudition. Interpretation. Complication.
(Slowly) Now is a time for simplicity. Now is a time for, dare I say
it, kindness. (Searchingly) I thought being extremely smart would take care of it.
But I see that I have been found out. Ooohhh.
I’m scared. Oh, God. I want…I want…No. I want to hide. I just want to curl up into a little ball.
ABright Room Called Day- Tony Kushner
ZILLAH: Dear Mr. President,
I know you will never read this letter. I’m fully aware of the fact that letters to you don’t
even make it to the White House, that they’re brought to an office building in Maryland where
civil-servant types are paid to answer the sane ones. Crazy, hostile letters- like mine- the ones
written in crayon on butcher paper, the ones made of letters cut out of magazines- these get
sent to the FBI, analyzed, Xeroxed and burned. But I send them anyway, once a day, and do
you know why? Because the loathing I pour into these pages is so ripe, so full-to-bursting, that it
is my firm belief that anyone touching them will absorb into their hands some of the toxic energy
contained therein. This toxin will be passed upwards- it is the nature of bureaucracies to pass
things vertically- till eventually, through a network of handshakes, the Under-Secretary of
Outrageous Falsehoods will shake hands with the Secretary for Pernicious Behavior under the
Cloak of Night, who will, on a weekly basis in Cabinet meetings, shake hands with you before
you nod off to sleep. In this way, through osmosis, little droplets of contagion are being rubbed
into your leathery flesh every day- in this great country of ours there must be thousands of
people who are sending you poisoned post. We wait for the day when all the grams and drams
and dollops of detestation will destroy you. We attack from below. Our day will come. You can
try to stop me. You can raise the price of stamps again. I’ll continue to write. I’m saving up for a
word processor. For me and my cause, money is no object.
Love,Zillah
Angels in America- Tony Kushner
HARPER: I feel better, I do, I…feel better. There are ice crystals in my lungs, wonderful and
sharp. And the snow smells like cold, crushed peaches. And there’s something… some current
of blood in the wind, how strange, it has that iron taste. Where am I? (looking around, then
realizing) Antarctica. This is Antarctica! Oh boy oh boy, LOOK at this, I… Wow, I must’ve
really snapped the tether, huh? I want to stay here forever. Set up camp. Build things. Build a
city, an enormous city made up of frontier forts, dark wood and green roofs and high gates made
of pointed logs and bonfires burning on every street corner. I should build by a river. Where are
the forests? I’ll plant them and grow them. I’ll live off caribou fat, I’ll melt it over the bonfires and
drink it from long, curved goat-horn cups. It’ll be great. I want to make a new world here. So that
I never have to go home again. I can have anything I want here–maybe even companionship,
someone who has…desire for me. There isn’t anyone…maybe an Eskimo. Who could ice-fish for
food. And help me build a nest for when the baby comes. Here, I can be pregnant. And I can
have any kind of baby I want. I’m going to like this place. It’s my own National Geographic
Special! Oh! Oh! (She holds her stomach) I think… I think I felt her kicking. Maybe I’ll give birth
to a baby covered with thick white fur, and that way she won’t be cold. My breasts will be full of
hot cocoa so she doesn’t get chilly. And if it gets really cold, she’ll have a pouch I can crawl into.
Like a marsupial. We’ll mend together. That’s what we’ll do; we’ll mend.
Angels in America- Tony Kushner
HARPER: Night flight to San Francisco; chase the moon across America. God, it’s been years
since I was on a plane. When we hit 35,000 feet we’ll have reached the tropopause, the great
belt of calm air, as close as I’ll ever get to the ozone. I dreamed we were there. The plane leapt
the tropopause, the safe air, and attained the outer rim, the ozone, which was ragged and torn,
patches of it threadbare as old cheesecloth, and that was frightening. But I saw something that
only I could see because of my astonishing ability to see such things: Souls were rising, from
the earth far below, souls of the dead, of people who had perished, from famine, from war, from
the plague, and they floated up, like skydivers in reverse, limbs all akimbo, wheeling and
spinning. And the souls of these departed joined hands, clasped ankles, and formed a web, a
great net of souls, and the souls were three-atom oxygen molecules of the stuff of ozone, and
the outer rim absorbed them and was repaired. Nothing’s lost forever. In this world, there’s a
kind of painful progress. Longing for what we’ve left behind, and dreaming ahead. At least I
think that’s so.
Angels in America- Tony Kushner
HARPER: People who are lonely, people left alone, sit talking nonsense to the air,
imagining…beautiful systems dying, old fixed orders spiraling apart…
When you look at the ozone layer, from the outside, from a spaceship, it looks like a pale
blue halo, a gentle, shimmering, aureole encircling the atmosphere encircling the earth. Thirty
miles above our heads, a thin layer of three-atom oxygen molecules, product of photosynthesis,
which explains the fussy vegetable preference for visible light, its rejection of darker rays and
emanations. Danger from without. It’s a kind of gift, from God, the crowning touch to the
creation of the world: guardian angels, hands linked, make a spherical net, a blue-green nesting
orb, a shell of safety for life itself. But everywhere, things are collapsing, lies surfacing, systems
of defense giving way…This is why, Joe, this is why I shouldn’t be left alone.
Assassins- John Weidman
LYNETTE: I was like you once. Lost. Confused. A piece of shit. Then I met Charlie…I was
sitting on the beach in Venice. I’d just had a big fight with my daddy about, I don’t know, my eye
make-up or the bombing of Cambodia. He said I was a drug addict and a whore and I should
get out of his house forever. I went down to the beach and sat down on the sand and cried. I felt
like I was disappearing. Like the whole world was dividing into two parts. Me, and everybody
else. And then this guy came down the beach, this dirty-looking little elf. He stopped in front of
meand smiled this twinkly devil smile and said, “Your daddy kicked you out.” He knew! “Your
daddy kicked you out”! How could he know? My daddy didn’t tell him, so who could’ve? God.
God sent this dirty-looking little elf to save a little girl lost on a beach. He smiled again and
touched my hair and off he went. And for a minute I just watched him go. Then I ran and caught
his hand, and until they arrested him for stabbing Sharon Tate, I never let it go.
HowI Learned to Drive- Paula Vogel
LIL’ BIT: I never saw him again. I stayed away from Christmas and Thanksgiving for years
after. It took my uncle seven years to drink himself to death. First he lost his job, then his wife
and finally his driver’s license. He retreated to his house and had his bottles delivered. One
night he tried to go downstairs to the basement–and he flew down the steep basement stairs.
My aunt came by weekly to put food on the porch-and she noticed the mail and the papers
stacked up, uncollected. They found him at the bottom of the stairs. Just steps away from his
dark room. Now that I’m old enough, there are some questions I would have liked to have asked
him. Who did it to you, Uncle Peck? How old were you? Were you eleven?
Sometimes I think of my uncle as a kind of Flying Dutchman. In the opera, the Dutchman
is doomed to wander the sea; but every seven years he can come ashore–and if he finds a
maiden who will love him of her own free will–he will be released. And I see Uncle Peck in my
mind, in his Chevy ’56, a spirit driving up and down the roads of Carolina–looking for a young
girl who, of her own free will, will love him. Release him.
Crimes of the Heart- Beth Henley
BABE: After I shot Zackery, I put the gun down on the piano bench, and then I went out into the
kitchen and made up a pitcher of lemonade. I was dying of thirst. My mouth was just as dry as a
bone. I made it just the way I like it, with lots of sugar and lots of lemon- about ten lemons in all.
Then I added two trays of ice and stirred it up with my wooded stirring spoon. Then I drank three
glasses, one right after the other. They were large glasses- about this tall. Then suddenly my
stomach kind of swole all up. I guess what caused it was all that sour lemon Then what I did
was? I wiped my mouth off with the back of my hand, like this? I did it to clear off all those little
beads of water that had settled there. Then I called out to Zackery. I said, “Zackery, I’ve made
some lemonade. Can you use a glass?” But he didn’t answer. So I poured him a glass anyway
and I took it out to him. And there he was, lying on the rug. And he was looking up at me trying
to speak words. I said “What?? Lemonade?? You don’t want it? Would you like a Coke
instead?” Then I got the idea- he was telling me to call on the phone for medical help. So I got
on the phone and called up the hospital. I gave my name and address and I told them my
husband was shot and he was lying on the rug and there was plenty of blood. I guess that’s
gonna look kinda bad. Me fixing that lemonade before I called the hospital. I tell you, I think the
reason I made up the lemonade, I mean besides the fact that my mouth was bone dry, was that
I was afraid to call the authorities. I was afraid. I- I really think I was afraid they would see that I
had tried to shoot Zackery, in fact that I had shot him, and they would accuse me of possible
murder and send me away to jail. I mean, in fact, that’s what did happen. That’s what is
happening- ’cause here I am just about ready to go right off to the Parchment Prison Farm. Yes,
here I am just practically on the brink of utter doom. Why, I feel so all alone.
Pterodactyls- Nicky Silver
EMMA: Hello everybody. I’m dead. How are you? I’m glad I killed myself. I’m not
recommending it for others, mind you—no Dr. Kevorkian am I. But it’s worked out for me.
Looking back, I don’t think I was every supposed to have been born to begin with. Of course
the idea that anything is “supposed to be” implies a master plan, and I don’t believe in that kind
of thing. When I say I shouldn’t have been born, I mean that my life was never all that
pleasant. And there was no real reason for it. I was pretty. I had money. I was lucky enough to
be born in a time and into a class where I had nothing but opportunities. I look around and there
are crippled people and blind people and refugees and I can’t believe I had the gall to whine
about anything! I had my health—oh sure, I complained a lot, but really I was fine. And I had
love! Granted the object of my affections was a latent, or not-so-latent homosexual as it turned
out, who was infected with the HIV virus, who in turn infected me and my unborn baby—but isn’t
that really picking nits? I can never thank Todd enough for giving me the gun, because for the
first time, I’m happy. The pain is gone and I remember everything.
Raised in Captivity- Nicky Silver
BERNADETTE: Can’t we be honest, at last, for once? How long can we possibly pretend we’re
happy? A year? Many years? The rest of our lives, I suppose. But one more day will break
me.…
Go after her. We’re strangers, really. You see a world in dreams and I don’t want to. I have to
find some happiness in things, things I can touch, my things, my child, my skin. So go.[]I no
longer need you. We’ve made so many compromises and told so many lies. I thought I only
deserved crumbs—Don’t worry, Kip. You’ll have money. I’ll see to that. You helped me escape,
and more than that, you gave me what I wanted when I didn’t know I wanted it. A child, the
chance to do something right. But don’t insult me with feelings. I think, I always knew, you
didn’t love me either. You simply hated your life as much as I hated mine. So can’t we call
things even and go our separate ways? You’ll never be poor. I owe you everything. Here.
(She holds out the tickets to Kip)
Laughing Wild- Christopher Durang
WOMAN:Iwant to talk to you about life. It’s just too difficult to be alive, isn’t it, and try to
function? There are all these people to deal with. I tried to buy a can of tuna fish in the
supermarket, and there was this person standing right in front of where I wanted to reach out to
get the tuna fish, and I waited a while, to see if they’d move, and they didn’t—they were looking
at tuna fish too, but they were taking a real long time on it, reading the ingredients on each can
like they were a book, a pretty boring book if you ask me, but nobody has; so I waited a long
while, and they didn’t move, and I couldn’t get to the tuna fish cans; and I thought about asking
them to move, but then they seemed so stupid not to have sensed that I needed to get by them
that I had this awful fear that it would do no good, no good at all, to ask them, they’d probably
say something like, “We’ll move when we’re goddam ready you nagging bitch” and then what
would I do? And so then I started to cry out of frustration, quietly, so as not to disturb anyone,
and still, even though I was softly sobbing, this stupid person didn’t grasp that I needed to get by
them, and so I reached over with my fist, and I brought it down real hard on his head and
screamed: “Would you kindly move asshole!!!”
And the person fell to the ground, and looked totally startled, and some child nearby
started to cry, and I was still crying, and I couldn’t imagine making use of the tuna fish now
anyway, and so I shouted at the child to stop crying—I mean, it was drawing too much attention
to me—and I ran out of the supermarket, and I thought, I’ll take a taxi to the Metropolitan
Museum of Art, I need to be surrounded with culture right now, not tuna fish.
‘dentity Crisis- Christopher Durang
JANE: Well, a few days ago I woke up and I heard this voice saying “It wasn’t enough.” Then it
started to come back to me. When I was eight years old, someone brought me to a theatre with
lots of other children. We had come to see a production of Peter Pan. And I remember
something seemed wrong with the whole production, odd things kept happening. Like when the
children would fly, the ropes would keep breaking and the actors would come thumping to the
ground and they’d have to be carried off by the stagehands. There seemed to be an unlimited
supply of understudies to take the children’s places, and then they’d fall to the ground. And the
crocodile that chases Captain Hook seemed to be a real crocodile, it wasn’t an actor, and at one
point it fell off the stage, crushing several children in the front row.
Several understudies came and took their places in the audience. And from scene to scene
Wendy seemed to get fatter and fatter until finally by the second act she was immobile and had
to be moved with a cart. The voice belonged to the actress playing Peter Pan. You remember
how in the second act Tinkerbell drinks some poison that Peter’s about to drink in order to save
him? And then Peter turns to the audience and he says that Tinkerbell’s going to die because
not enough people believe in fairies, but that if everybody in the audience claps real hard to
show that they do believe in fairies, then maybe Tinkerbell won’t die. And so then all the children
start to clap. We clapped very hard and very long. My palms hurt and even started to bleed I
clapped so hard. Then suddenly the actress playing Peter Pan turned to the audience and said
“That wasn’t enough. You didn’t clap hard enough. Tinkerbell’s dead.” Uh… well, and… and then
everyone started to cry. The actress stalked offstage and refused to continue with the play, and
they finally had to bring down the curtain. No one could see anything through all the tears, and
the ushers had to come help the children up the aisles and out into the street. I don’t think any of
us were ever the same after that experience.
The Perfect Wedding- Charles Mee
MERIDEE:
So, I find you at last, and it turns out that you’re in love with Ariel?
I thought the next big event of my life would be getting married but now I see the next big event
will be dying. Because it’s over and you went so fast in the arms of someone else how could
anyone ever trust love again when it can disappear so fast and leave me all alone forever I was
thinking all this time: we’re so important to one another and it turns out I was wrong about the
biggest thing in my life how can I think I can be right about anything else? the time you came
home from being away I said to you, “you’ve come home” and you said yes and I said but I don’t
think so I think you left two months ago and you are never coming back because when I called
one time I felt something had happened I heard it on the phone and you said I don’t know
What don’t you know? I don’t know if I can come back. Because you’ve fallen in love, I said?
What? Because you’ve fallen for another woman? Don’t trivialize it, he said. it felt as though all
at once the city had been bombed out the house had been burned down I asked him: Have you
had a love affair? He said no. You’ve fallen for someone else He said no.
You’ve had a fling. A one night stand. My heart had stopped. No, he said. I said I don’t believe it.
Believe what you want, he said. And now I’ve stopped breathing. And I think the truth is I
always came last and I hate you for that and now I see I’m dying the only person I’ve ever loved
in my life my life itself and now you’re gone and I will never have you back and if you do come
back I will say to you just go just go because you are always just leaving me every time you go
away and come back you say you can’t come back to me and I always felt from the very first,
from the first night we spent together, the pain of your rejecting me. so go this time you are
going to leave me eventually I have always known it, so leave me now I’ve pursued you and
pursued you and pursued you in every way for all these years and you have rejected me and
rejected me and rejected me I have to rip you out of my heart but it just tears me apart like a rag
you say I say these things to manipulate you but how can I manipulate you? when you stick a
knife into an animal it will kick and jerk and cry out before it dies it can’t help itself I keep waiting
for my love for you to stop, to stop but it won’t end and I can’t bear it I miss being with you, just
hearing you breathe holding you through the night if I would dare I couldn’t help myself either
pretending I didn’t care turning over myself in bed, turning my back to you hoping you would see
my behavior as a mirror of your own seeing you should turn back to me not giving you
everything I could everything you wanted every single thing because you sweet sweet soul you
had deserved every single thing in life you wished. And I so regret not finding a way to find you,
instead of withdrawing from you- and so making you feel, I suppose, not loved, not pursued, not
treasured not precious as I felt you were. Not giving you all the things I felt for you. And so I
keep trying over and over to let you go, and even as I say that it takes my breath away to think
that I would let go of the only person in my life I have ever loved so completely, you’ve been my
life itself to me, that’s what I find so hard to let go of and why, when I come close to letting go,
it feels like the only death I’ll die. And is this the way I’m going to feel the rest of my life?
Or will it go away like a single breath?
Doubt- John Patrick Shanley
MRS. MILLER: You accept what you got to accept and you work with it. … Well he’s got to be
somewhere, maybe he’s doin’ some good too … Well maybe some of them boys want to get
caught. … That’s why his father beat him. Not the wine. … I’m talkin’ about the boy’s nature,
nun. Not anything he’s done. You can’t hold a child responsible for what God gave him to be. …
But then there’s the boy’s nature … Forget it then. Forcing people to say things. My boy came to
your school ‘cause they were gonna kill him in the public schools. His father don’t like him. He
come to your school, kids don’t like him. One man is good to him, this priest. And does a man
have his reasons? Yes. Everybody does. You have your reasons but, do I ask the man why he’s
good to my son? No. I don’t care why. My son needs some man to care about him. And to see
him through the way he wants to go. And thank God this educated man, with some kindness in
him, wants to do just that.
Are You Ready?- David Auburn
WOMAN:I’m the food critic for the Times, and I’ve been anxious for some time now to get my
claws into the throat of that pompous evil weasel of a restaurateur and rip him to absolute
shreds for the benefit of my rather unusually loyal readership. I’m sorry. I’m not a vindictive
person. I think I’m basically a decent person but I’d been watching people humiliating
themselves for a table at that place for months, and the restaurant sucks, honestly: their foie
gras is dry, their lapin en croute a l’Aubergine tastes like something my cat coughed up when it
had the flu last winter, their wine list is emaciated, their syphilitic pastry chef couldn’t frost a
cupcake if you held a gun to his mother’s head… I’d been dying to get a crack at it but they
wouldn’t let me in, not even with a fake name. But tonight I was just walking by and I saw this
nice-looking guy, just normal looking, not a big celeb or anything- he was waiting a table, so I
thought, Why not me? Then I was offered a table and I leaped at it and now that supercilious
creep is going to have a nasty surprise when he opens the paper tomorrow morning, I promise
you. That does sound vindictive, doesn’t it? I don’t mean it to. I’m not a mean person. I’m just
like anyone else. I like a decent meal. I like to rent a couple of videos and relax on a Sunday
night. I like to drive up north for a weekend in the fall when the leaves start to turn. That sounds
like a horrible personal as, doesn’t it? “Single Female, thirties, enjoys food film, and foliage,
seeks single male twenties-thirties for a profound lifelong commitment”- Not that I’d ever ever
write an ad like that- I’m not desperate, believe me, I’m fine. But all right, yes, I’d like to meet
someone, I’d- I mean I meet plenty of people, At parties, or- Plenty of successful, brilliant, witty
people- all right not plenty but some- and you try to be- but you know people get the paper, they
read your stuff and you develop a reputation and even though you’re just doing your job- like
last month when I wrote that the new unbelievably expensive and pretentions sushi place
downtown was enough to make an American feel a little less guilty about dropping the atomic
bomb on Nagasaki- you can develop a reputation for, I don’t know, harshness. And you start to
wish you could make a clean break. You imagine what it would be like to meet someone totally
new- like, I don’t know, anyone- this guy here- just an attractive, well-dressed- I mean I’m not
crazy about the tie, frankly, I would have gone with something a little less late-mid-eighties, but
who cares? Doesn’t matter. You have to be flexible. And you have to be ready: you couldn’t plan
it or hope for it. You would simply have to be prepared to recognize your chance when it came.
When that person came along. I sometimes imagine something like that happening. Then I
come to my senses and remind myself how unlikely that would be.
Fences- August Wilson
ROSE: I been standing with you! I been right here with you, Troy. I got a life too. I gave
eighteen years of my life to stand in the same spot with you. Don’t you think I ever wanted other
things? Don’t you think I had dreams and hopes? What about my life? What about me? Don’t
you think it ever crossed my mind to want to know other men? That I wanted to lay up
somewhere and forget about my responsibilities? That I wanted someone to make me laugh so
I could feel good? You not the only one who’s got wants and needs. But I held on to you, Troy.
I took all my feelings, my wants and needs, my dreams…and I buried them inside you. I planted
a seed and watched and prayed over it. I planted myself inside you and waited to bloom. And it
didn’t take me no eighteen years to find out the soil was hard and rocky and it wasn’t never
gonna bloom. But I held on to you, Troy. I held you tighter. You was my husband. I owed you
everything I had. Every part of me I could find to give you. And upstairs in that room…with the
darkness falling in on me…I gave everything I had to try and erase the doubt that you wasn’t the
finest man in the world. And wherever you was going…I wanted to be there with you. Cause
you was my husband. Cause that’s the only way I was gonna survive as your wife. You always
talking about what you give…and what you don’t have to give. But you take, too. You take…
and don’t even know nobody’s giving!
Reasons to be Pretty- Neil LaBute
CARLY: I’m very attractive. I am. I’ve always been that way but it’s no great big deal to me—
if anything, it’s worked against me for most of my life. (Beat.) It’s about this (Points.) My face. I
was born with it, people. That’s all. I have been given this thing to wear around, my features,
and I’m stuck with it. And yes, over the years it’s gotten me things, I won’t lie about that, dates
and into clubs that I really wanted to get into or smiles from my father . . . but as I got older it
suddenly became a kind of, I dunno what, but almost like a problem. A real bother that I don’t
have any control over. (Beat.) Listen, I’m not stupid, I know I should be thankful, that I should
pray to heaven and be happy that I’m not scarred or missing an ear—I know girls who hate, I
mean, despise their noses and mouths or the fact that their eyes are too far out on their faces . .
I don’t have any of those problems and I’m happy about that. I look in the mirror and I see some
beautiful woman looking back at me; my worst day, a line or two, a little pale or whatnot, but a
really good face in there. Smiling. I’m not saying that I don’t understand how I got lucky in
many ways, I do get that, I do, I just want folks to comprehend that beauty comes with a
price, just like ugly does. A different one, of course, and I’ll take what I’ve got, but I’ve cried
myself to sleep at night because of who I am as well, and you should know that . . . (Beat.) I
hope my baby’s OK,—did I mention that we found out it was a little girl? But I really hope she’s
no more than pretty, that’s my wish. That she’s not some beauty queen that people can’t stop
staring at because I’d hate that for her . . . to be this object, some thing that people can’t help
gawking at. ‘Cause if she is— born like I was, is what I’m saying—if she ends up with a face
that is some sorta magnet for men, the way I’ve been . . . I’d almost rather it was a situation
where she was oblivious to it—not blind or anything, I wouldn’t wish that on her, but close.
Some sort of oblivion that gets pasted over her eyes so she can go about life and not be aware
that people are cruel in many ways. . . not just with their words but with the ways they look at
you and desire you and, and, and . . . almost hate you because of it. (Smiles.) I’m sorry, I didn’t
mean to get all heavy or anything, but I do think about it sometimes. My shift at work’s kinda
long, you know? It is . . . so I’ve usually got some time on my hands to, you know. . . whatever.
Think, I guess.
Cloud Nine- Caryl Churchill
BETTY: I used to think Clive was the one who liked sex. But then I found I missed it. I used to
touch myself when I was very little, I thought I’d invented something wonderful. I used to do it
to go to sleep with or to cheer myself up, and one day it was raining and I was under the kitchen
table, and my mother saw me with my hand under my dress rubbing away, and she dragged me
out so quickly I hit my head and it bled and I was sick, and nothing was said, and I never did it
again till this year. I thought if Clive wasn’t looking at me there wasn’t a person there. And one
night in bed in my flat I was so frightened I started touching myself. I thought my hand might go
through into space. I touch my face, it was there, my arm, my breast, and my hand sent down
where I thought it shouldn’t, and I thought well there is somebody there. It felt very sweet, it was
a feeling from very long ago, it was very soft, just barely touching and I felt myself gathering
together more and more and I felt angry with Clive and angry with my mother and I went on and
on defying them, and there was this vast feeling growing in me and all around me and they
couldn’t stop me and no one could stop me and I was there and coming and coming. Afterwards
I thought I’d betrayed Clive. My mother would kill me. But I felt triumphant because I was a
separate person from them. And I cried because I didn’t want to be. But I don’t cry about it any
more. Sometimes I do it three times in one night and it really is great fun.
Top Girls- Caryl Churchill
GRET: We come to hell through a big mouth. Hell’s black and red. It’s like the village where I
come from. There’s a river and a bridge and houses. There’s places on fire like when the
soldiers come. There’s a big devil sat on a roof with a big hole in his arse and he’s scooping
stuff out of it with a big ladle and it’s falling down on us, and it’s money, so a lot of the women
stop and get some. But most of us is fighting the devils. There’s lots of little devils our size, and
we get them down all right and give them a beating. There’s lots of funny creatures round your
feet, you don’t like to look, like rats and lizards, and nasty things, a bum with a face, and fish
with legs, and faces on things that don’t have faces on. But they don’t hurt, you just keep going.
Well we’d had worse, you see, we’d had the Spanish. We’d all had family killed. My big son die
on a wheel. Birds eat him. My baby, a soldier run her through with a sword. I’d had enough, I
was mad, I hate the bastards. I come out of my front door that morning and shout till my
neighbors come out and I said, “Come on, we’re going where the evil come from and pay the
bastards out.” And they all come out just as they was from baking or from washing in their
aprons, and we push down the street and the ground opens up and we go through a big mouth
into a street just like ours but in Hell. I’ve got a sword in my hand from somewhere and I fill a
basket with gold cups they drink out of down there. You just keep running on and fighting, you
didn’t stop for nothing. Oh we give them devils such a beating.
Brighton Beach Memoirs- Neil Simon
BLANCHE: I’m not going to let you hurt me, Nora. I’m not going to let you tell me that I don’t
love you or that I haven’t tried to give you as much as I gave Laurie . . . God knows I’m not
perfect because enough angry people in this house told me so tonight . . . But I am not going to
be a doormat for all the frustrations and unhappiness that you or Aunt Kate or anyone else
wants to lay at my feet . . . I did not create this Universe. I do not decide who lives and dies, or
who’s rich or poor or who feels loved and who feels deprived. If you feel cheated that Laurie
gets more than you, than I feel cheated that my husband died at thirty-six. And if you keep on
feeling that way, you’ll end up like me . . . with something much worse than loneliness or
helplessness and that’s self-pity. Believe me, there is nothing worse than human being who
thrives on his own misfortunes .. . I am sorry, Nora, that you feel unloved and I will do everything
I can to change it but I will not go back to being that frightened, helpless woman that I created! .
. . I’ve already buried someone I love. Now it’s time to bury someone I hate.
Brighton Beach Memoirs- Neil Simon
NORA: Oh, God, he was so handsome. Always dressed so dapper, his shoes always shined. I
always thought he should have been a movie star…like Gary Cooper… only very short. Mostly,
I remember his pockets. When I was six or seven, he always brought me home a little surprise.
Like a Hershey or a top. He’d tell me to go get it in his coat pocket. So I’d run to the closet and
put my hand in and it felt as big as a tent. I wanted to crawl in there and go to sleep. And there
were all these terrific things in there, like Juicy Fruit gum or Spearmint Life Savers and bits of
cellophane and crumbled pieces of tobacco and movie stubs and nickels and pennies and
rubber bands and paper clips and gray suede gloves that he wore in the wintertime.
Then I found his coat in Mom’s closet and I put my hand in his pocket. And everything
was gone. It was emptied and dry-cleaned and it felt cold…And that’s when I knew he was really
Dead.
In the Next Room (or The Vibrator Play)- Sarah Ruhl
MRS. GIVINGS: Do you want more children, Elizabeth? That is a tactless question, you don’t
need to answer, forgive me, sometimes I say whatever is in my head.
I want more children and my husband desperately wants more children but I am afraid of
another birth, aren’t you? When I have birth I remember so clearly, the moment her head was
coming out of my body, I thought: why would any rational creature do this twice, knowing what
I know now? And then she came out and clambered right on to my breast and tried to eat me,
she was so hungry, so hungry it terrified me- her hunger. And I thought: is that the first
emotion? Hunger? And not hunger for food but wanting to eat other people? Specifically one’s
mother? And then I thought- isn’t it strange, isn’t it strange about Jesus? That is to say, about
Jesus being a man? For it is women who are eaten- who turn their bodies into food- I have up
my blood- there was so much blood- and I gave up my body- but I couldn’t feed her, could not
turn my body into food, and she was so hungry. I suppose that makes me an inferior kind of
woman and a very inferior kind of Jesus.
In the Next Room (or The Vibrator Play)- Sarah Ruhl
ELIZABETH: My mother told me to pray each day since I was a little girl, to pray that you
borrow everything, everyone you love, from God. That way your heart doesn’t ‘break when you
have to give your son, or your mother, or your husband, back to God. I prayed, Jesus, let me be
humble. I borrowed my child, I borrowed my husband, I borrowed my own life from you, God.
But he felt like mine not like God’s he felt like mine more mine than anything.
God must have this huge horrible cabinet- al the babies who get returned- and all those
babies inside, they’re all crying even with God Himself to rock them to sleep, still they want
their mothers. So when I started to feel something for this baby, for your baby, I thought no, take
her back God. When I first met her all I could think was: she is alive and Henry is not. I had all
this milk- I wished it would dry up. Just get through the year, I thought. Your milk will dry up and
you will forget. The more healthy your baby got, the more dead my baby became. I thought of
her like a tick. I thought- fill her up and then pop! You will see the blood of my Henry
underneath. But she seemed so grateful for the milk. Sometimes I hated her for it. But she
would look at me, she would give me this look- I do not know what to call it if it is not called
love. I hope every day you keep her- you keep her closer to you- and you remember the blood
that her milk was made from. The blood of my son, my Henry. Good-bye, Mrs. Givings.
Fading Joy- Walter Wykes
JOY: [Looking up into the sky.] Hello? Mother Moon? It’s me. Joy. Can you hear me?
[Pause.] Hello? [Pause.] I know you’re up there. I can see you, but … you’re so far away. Why
are you so far away?
[Pause.] I just want to talk for a few minutes. Like we used to. Do you remember how we used
to talk? It was such fun! What … what was it we used to talk about? I’ve forgotten. Beautiful
things, I … I know that, but … I can’t … I can’t quite … [Pause.]
I don’t even remember how I got here. Isn’t that strange? I know I came from someplace
warm. Warm and dark. And water. There was water. I remember floating in the night sky … or …
or deep in the ocean. And I remember voices. Big soft angel voices. They told me things.
Secrets. They sang to me. Beautiful songs! About … [Pause.]
I … I can’t remember what they were about anymore. I try, but … they’re gone. Won’t you
tell me, Mother Moon? Won’t you whisper in my ear just one more time? Please?
[Pause.] Why won’t you answer me? [Pause.] What have I done wrong?
Marion Bridge- Daniel MacIvor
AGNES: In the dream I’m drowning. But I don’t know it at first. At first I hear water and I
imagine it’s going to be a lovely dream. Even though every time I dream the dream I’m drowning
each and everytime I dream the dream I forget. Fooled by the sound of the water I guess and I
imagine it’s a dream of a wonderful night on the beach, or a cruise in the moonlight, or an
August afternoon in a secret cove–but a moment after having been fooled into expecting
bonfires or handsome captains or treasures in the weedy shore it becomes very clear that the
water I’m hearing is the water that’s rushing around my ears and fighting its way into my mouth
and pulling me back down into its dark, soggy oblivion. No captains, no treasures, no bonfires
for me, no in my dream I’m drowning. And then, just when it seems it’s over–that I drown and
that’s the dream–in the distance, on the beach, I see a child. A tall thin child, maybe nine or ten.
And his sister, younger, five. Then behind them comes their mother spreading out a blanket on
the sand. It’s a picnic. And beside the mother is the man. Tall. Strong. And broad shoulders
good for sitting on if you’re five, or even ten. Good for leaning on if you’re tired, good for crying
on if you’re sad. And he’s got his hands on his hips and he’s looking out at the water, and he
sees something. Me. And he reaches out and touches his wife’s elbow who at that very moment
sees something too and then the children, as if they’re still connected to their mother’s eyes,
think they might see the same thing. And with all my strength–if you can call strength that
strange, desperate, exhausted panic–I wave. My right arm. High. So they’ll be sure to see. And
they do. They see me. And then all of them, standing in a perfect line, they all wave back. The
little girl, her brother, their mother and the man. They smile and wave. Then the mother returns
to her blanket and the basket of food she has there, the man sits, stretching out his legs,
propping himself up on one arm, and the little boy runs off in search of starfish or crab shells
and the little girl smiles and waves, smiles and waves and smiles and waves. And then I drown.
And that’s so disturbing because you know what they say when you die in your dream. Strange.
But stranger still I guess is that I’m still here.
AStreetcar Named Desire- Tennessee Williams
BLANCHE: I, I, I took the blows on my face and my body! All those deaths! The long parade to
the graveyard. Father, Mother, Margaret that dreadful way. So big with it, she couldn’t be put in
a coffin, but had to be burned like rubbish! You came just in time for funerals Stella. And
funerals are pretty compared to death. Funerals are quiet, but deaths not always. Sometimes
their breathing is hoarse, sometimes it rattles, sometimes they cry out to you, “Don’t let me go!”
Even the old sometimes say it- “Don’t let me go”. As if you could stop them! Funerals are quiet,
with pretty flowers. And oh, what lovely boxes they pack you away in! Unless you were there at
the bed when they cried out “Hold me” you’d never suspect there was struggle for breath and
bleeding. You didn’t dream, but I saw! Saw! And now you sit there telling me with your eyes
that I let the place go. How in hell do you think all that sickness and dying was paid for? Death is
expensive Miss Stella! And old Cousin Jessie, right after Margaret’s, hers! The Grim Reaper put
his tent up on our doorstep! Stella, Belle Reve was his headquarters. Honey, that’s how it
slipped through my fingers. Which of them left us a fortune? Which of them left us a cent of
insurance even? Only poor Jessie- one hundred to pay for her coffin. That was it Stella! And I
with my pitiful salary at the school! Yes, accuse me! Sit there and stare at me, thinking I let the
place go. I let the place go! Where were you Stella? In bed with your Polack!
Death of a Salesman- Arthur Miller
LINDA: Then make Charley your father, Biff. You can’t do that, can you? I don’t say he’s a great
man. Willy Loman never made a lot of money. His name was never in the paper. He’s not the
finest character that ever lived. But he’s a human being, and a terrible thing is happening to him.
So attention must be paid. He’s not to be allowed to fall into his grave like an old dog. Attention,
attention must finally be paid to such a person. You called him crazy… no, a lot of people think
he’s lost his… balance. But you don’t have to be very smart to know what his trouble is. The man
is exhausted. A small man can be just as exhausted as a great man. He works for a company
thirty-six years this March, opens up unheard-of territories to their trademark, and now in his old
age they take his salary away.
Are they any worse than his sons? When he brought them business, when he was young,
they were glad to see him. But now his old friends, the old buyers that loved him so and always
found some order to hand him in a pinch–they’re all dead, retired. He used to be able to make
six, seven calls a day in Boston. Now he takes his valises out of the car and puts them back and
takes them out again and he’s exhausted. Instead of walking he talks now. He drives seven
hundred miles, and when he gets there no one knows him anymore, no one welcomes him. And
what goes through a man’s mind, driving seven hundred miles home without having earned a
cent? Why shouldn’t he talk to himself? Why? When he has to go to Charley and borrow fifty
dollars a week and pretend to me that it’s his pay? How long can that go on? How long? You
see what I’m sitting here and waiting for? And you tell me he has no character? The man who
never worked a day but for your benefit? When does he get the medal for that?
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof- Tennessee Williams
MAGGIE: Oh Brick. I get so lonely. Living with someone you love can be lonelier than living
entirely alone when the one you love doesn’t love you. You can’t even stand drinking out of the
same glass can you? … No! No, I wouldn’t. Why can’t you lose your good looks Brick? Most
drinking men lose theirs. Why can’t you. I think you’ve even gotten better looking since you
weren’t on the bottle. You were such a wonderful love. … You were so exciting to be in love
with. Mostly I guess because you were … If I thought you’d never never made love to me again,
why I’d find me the longest sharpest knife I could and I’d stick it straight into my heart. I’d do
that. Oh Brick how long does this have to go on, this punishment? Haven’t I served my term?
Can’t I apply for a pardon? … Is it any wonder. You know what I feel like? I feel all the time
like a cat on a hot tin roof.
Our Town- Thornton Wilder
EMILY: Mama, I’m here! I’m grown up! I love you all, everything! I can’t look at everything
hard enough. Oh, Mama, look at me one minute as though you really saw me. Mama, fourteen
years have gone by. I’m dead. You’re a grandmother, Mama! Wally’s dead, too. His appendix
burst on a camping trip to North Conway. We felt just terrible about it- don’t you remember?
But, just for a moment now we’re all together. Mama, just for a moment we’re happy. Let’s really
look at one another!…I can’t. I can’t go on. It goes so fast. We don’t have time to look at one
another. I didn’t realize. So all that was going on and we never noticed. Take me back– up the
hill– to my grave. But first: Wait! One more look. Good-bye , Good-bye world. Good-bye,
Grover’s Corners….Mama and Papa. Good-bye to clocks ticking….and Mama’s sunflowers. And
food and coffee. And new ironed dresses and hot baths….and sleeping and waking up. Oh,
earth, you are too wonderful for anybody to realize you. Do any human beings ever realize life
while they live it–every, every minute? (beat) I’m ready to go back
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