The Minotaur Speaks

In the darkness a line glimmers~
like a piece of spider silk, a tendril of its web~
quivers and pulls
around another corner,
then disappears in the gloom,
trembling in the rancid darkness, hot
and stale as a cellar,
binding the random corners of my chaotic home.

At one end clings the man the gods have sent to kill me~
(we’ll see about that!)~but the thread’s other end
winds and coils and shines,
leading . . . where?

Oh, farther into the maze where father Minos left me,
the bestial child his whore of a wife, my mother Pasiphae,
dropped nine months after coupling with the Thracian bull
whose member she had coveted~

mating monster with monster,
how did they expect to escape having a monster for their offspring!

And so Minos threw me into this foul place,
scrawled into confusion like a ball of tangled yarn,
no one can find a way out of, no matter how brave or cunning,
a darkness I explore to find but deeper darkness,
and there left me, to feed on sacrificial virgins,
the beautiful, pure-skinned, untouched
children of the Greeks.

I trip over their bones as I bang from wall to wall,
lost, hungry, bellowing in the dark,
still hearing the echoes of the weeping that come
from the maze’s mouth, where the others cower, crowd, and wait
their turn in the labyrinth, their death duel with the Minotaur.

The line tugs. Where does it go? It slackens again~who bound it
to the one Greek they promised would kill that abortion,
the bull-man~

as if I had no soul, no mind, no heart, no memory
of happiness under the sun’s gaze, and only howl and snort,
bucking my horns on the rocks in an agony of memory
of those few weeks I knew the bright flash
of day.

It tugs again, and thrums~he is looking for me, this Theseus,
with his smooth face, his eyes shining with bald terror,
imagining me~

one hand trembling on the rock face, the other
sweating at the end of the thread.
The thread! it may lead
back to the maze’s entrance, escape
out of this stinking darkness into the air and sun,

the immensity of light and breath of cloud and the sweet moon,
the high sky above me~could it?

Of course, it could!
Someone~
a lover?

someone who loves Theseus (even my mother didn’t love me!)

gave him, of the thread,
one end.
And the other
she holds, waiting for him,
standing patiently
at the dark hole where she saw him disappear,
frightened and hopeful,
feeling each quiver and jerk with fear,

to keep her dearest love from being killed and eaten by me.

What if I follow the line
it
shows,
so
white,
in
the darkness?

Lord sun above me, beyond this mantle of rock~
if I follow the thread, will it lead me back up to the flowery air
and the sighing
of the sea,
back to light and life and even
a hope for love
under the stars,
back to the heaven called day?

It slackens.
Grab it, now, beast!
It is so light~so frail~
how could anything so fragile be a promise a beast could believe,
a hope in this slaughterhouse, this fist of stench and weeping~
my hope?

I’ll let you guide me,
one way to my death
at the hands of Theseus, the other to my life
in a girl’s hands, bright with day.

Lead me, thread. And do not break
until I am dead
or free.
_____

The Apotheosis of Hillary

Saturday, June 7, 2008: I was, and am, a supporter of Barack Obama for president. However, my satirical play notwithstanding, I have always had a very high regard for Hillary Clinton. If Obama had not been running, I would have supported her. However, by her speech today, Hillary has won, not only my deeper respect, but also my affection, by conceding defeat as graciously as she has. May she long prevail. Hillary for Vice President!

The Assassination of Hillary

A play by Christopher Bernard

JACK ASSASSIN: A man in his early 40s, an unemployed travel agent. He carries a shiny new rifle. Near him, on the floor, stands a plastic water bottle.

SETTING: An attic with a window facing an unseen open space where a political rally is being held.

(CURTAIN UP on JACK ASSASSIN, sitting near a window in a dark attic and cradling a rifle. A laptop sits open on a small table nearby. From outside, distant sounds of a crowd, applause, whistles, shouts, etc., alternating with an unintelligible speech being made by an unknown speaker. JACK ASSASSIN listens, then takes a swig from a water bottle.
(His cell phone rings. The sounds from outside continue over his speech, at a lower volume to prevent distraction.)
JACK ASSASSIN
(in a low voice) Jack Assassin. . . . Jimmy? … I don’t know, she’s not there yet…. Looks like the governor, mayor, some sort of congressman, correction: congressperson … bunch of girls from Frontenac, a choir … I don’t know, maybe they want to sing the Hallelujah chorus. Where’s Mel, does he have the truck? … good … good … nice … no, nobody’s been up here in years it looks, like I said … yeah … yeah … right … right … yeah, cool, right … Remember Travelgate!… Later … (He closes the cell phone and looks back out the window. After a moment, he cocks the rifle and sites along it toward a distant target, careful not to stick the barrel out the window. Sound of speaker, followed by a burst of applause, whistles, shouts, etc. He lowers the gun and watches.
(Suddenly he turns to the audience and walks, still holding the rifle, to the edge of the stage.)
JACK ASSASSIN
You probably wonder why the hell I want to kill Hillary Rodham Clinton. What am I doing? Do I still remember Travelgate? Who the hell does? Sorry! Maybe you’re right to forget. These are forgetful times. No one remembers Travelgate. All those White House travel agents, kicked out on their butts by evil Hillary, the very first month the Clintons were in office. Well, I remember it, the American Association of Travel Agents remembers it, and we aren’t about to forget on whose watch it happened. You remember how the Clintons had seven innocent office workers investigated by the FBI and then fired for incompetence, just so some friends of the Clintons could take over the business? You don’t? What’s the matter with you? You sure never tried making your living spending all night trying to arrange vacations in Borneo for bowling clubs in Davenport, Iowa! It was all over TV, you couldn’t have missed it! That wasn’t no “special effects,” people – those were real firings of real people! It was a conspiracy of the FBI, the Injustice Department, and the Clintons to take over the US of A for the liberal elite and put them all on expensive no-frills air carriers! It was the first battle in their war against the American way of life, make no mistake about that! They were gunning for the travel agents ’cause they thought, hell, they’re the most vulnerable, nobody’s gonna wanna defend them! And then we go for the janitors, then we go for the office clerks, and then we go for the factory workers. And then the religious folk, the fundamentalists, the evangelicals, and the Baptists, the Presbyterians, the Lutherans . . . well, maybe they can have the Presbyterians and Lutherans, those spawn of Satan! But they'll go on and on till no travel agent or employee is safe and we can’t even have Christmas vacation for the school kids anymore, and Easter is banished from the calendar! After Travelgate, look what happened - NAFTA! Then Whitewater! Then Monica Lewisky! No, we’re not letting the Clintons take control of this country again! Not again. Not on our watch. Not on this watch!
(Storm of applause from outside. JACK ASSASSIN goes back to the window.)
JACK ASSASSIN
(long pause) Holy Moses, look at the Secret Service! They really do talk to their sleeves…. Maybe they should look at all the windows in this building …
(He suddenly pulls back from the window, hiding. His cell phone rings.)
JACK ASSASSIN
(opening it) Jack Assassin. You have to keep calling here? …. I can’t, the goddam vibrator doesn’t work … (a sarcastic laugh) she’ll get a vibrator she’ll never forget! … No, I didn’t…. Wi-Fi? Sure, I hacked into somebody’s node, hell it’s probably the Secret Service’s, it works fine … Not that again! … Do you really ..? Look, we decided… Said who, said what? You really want to get us all killed, don’t you … All right already! (He closes the cell) God damn technology! (He scrabbles in his backpack.) “No theatrical sense!” What is he talkin’ about, this ain’t Broadway! (pauses and glances back at the audience with a sarcastic look) Not yet! (pulls out a small eyeball computer camcorder and glares into the lens) “I’m ready for my close-up, Mr. DeMille!” (He settles the camcorder on the sill and aims it.) It’s not enough to post it on YouTube, now everybody’s got to see it in real time. And give everybody a chance to triangulate my position and catch me before I’m half-way down the stairs, ever think of that! I guess he hasn’t seen Vantage Point! Triangulate (he pauses, remembering), Whitewater, Ken Starr, wag the dog, it depends on what is is … Those were the days! But never again! No way are we letting those people back in the big house. Better the black guy than that.
(His cell phone rings.)
JACK ASSASSIN
Jesus H. . . .! (opens the cell) Jack Assassin. What now? … You can’t see anything? You a pissant director?.... OK, OK, keep your pants on … (goes to the window and adjusts the camcorder) … How’s that, Hitchcock? …
(In the distance the girl’s chorus can be heard singing America the Beautiful.)
JACK ASSASSIN
What? Now you can’t hear anything? … (puts cell down, rustles in his backpack for a microphone, plugs it into the laptop, places it next to the camcorder) … I’m a friggin’ Hollywood studio! … (into cell:) How’s that, Ingmar? … Good! Now, will you please let me go back to being an assassin, like I want to be? Thank you! (closes cell; listens to the chorus, lifts his rifle and aims through the window; at the end, he joins in, singing:) “with brotherhood, from sea to shining sea.”
(Distant applause. He continues to aim at the chorus.)
JACK ASSASSIN
Pretty blond, pretty redhead, pretty brunette … (lowers the rifle, than aims again, cocking the rifle) …. ugly Betty, ugly flatface, ugly wirehead … (puts his finger on the trigger: hold)…. POWPOWPOW! (lowers the gun and turns to the audience, grinning) Only kidding!
JACK ASSASSIN
(walking up to the stage edge, still carrying rifle)
You just hate this, don’t you? “I paid good money to see this show, and these a-holes are sticking me inside the head of an expletive-deleted assassin of our favorite political hero! Shero! Hillary Rodham Clinton! The next president of the United States of America! Do they think this is funny? Do they think this is entertainment? Do they think I’ll like this or, worse yet, it’s good for me? It’s not even a good sermon! If I want that, I can go to a Unitarian church! Just when I thought it was safe to go back to Berkeley Rep, they fling this at me.” Yep! Pretentious self-reflexive postmodern amoral anti-intellectual bull manure from the a-hole of America! Right! (he lifts rifle and scans the audience with it, then lowers the gun) Scared ya, didn’t I? “He is an actor, right? I mean, this is a play. Right? He isn’t really going to kill anybody? This is a stage rifle, it isn’t really loaded - is it? Wouldn’t be fair. We paid to see a play, not get killed.” (He stares at the audience, still holding the rifle. His cell phone rings; he opens cell, reads the caller’s number) Personal call, excuse me. (turns his back slightly) Yeah … Yeah yeah … yeah … right, two-percent …. I know I got one-percent last time, I’m sorry … I’ll be home late so don’t wait up … promise! … (closes cell) As if I didn’t have enough to worry about! … I’m telling you, next time they gotta get another guy for this assassination kee-rap, I’ve had it…. Where were we? Oh, yeah, you’re wondering if this is just a play … I mean it must be, it’s got a script, I had to memorize my lines and my blocking … the director’s gonna give me notes after the performance, he’ll say things like, your timing was really great at the top of your first monolog, but do you think you can speed it up on “is this a play” speech? It drags a little. And I’ll say, sure. But what is my motivation? And he’ll give me a look fit to kill. Then I’ll go home, feeling exhausted and abused. You, now, bought tickets and are sitting of your own free will in this theater, watching, with more or less interest, wondering where the hell this is going (as if I, the director, or, god help us, the writer knew – and I know for a fact he doesn’t!). You, my dears, could leave at any time. Except, of course, you won’t, out of a feeling of embarrassment. (He points the rifle once again at the audience, slowly scanning it.) Even if you felt your life depended on it. Because, after all, it’s just a play. It’s not life. It isn’t real. None of it is real. (Sound of distant cheers.) … That’s gotta be her! (rushes back to window) …
JACK ASSASSIN
(over the following speeches, speakers can be heard in the background, with occasional bursts of applause from the audience)
Holy shit, it’s the Man. Who the hell organized this thing! (makes a call on his cell) Hey, Jimmy! You lookin’ at your screen? No? Well, get your butt over there! We got somebody, but it sure ain’t Hillary. Unless she’s so lesbo, she’s turned into a drag king version of her own hubby! … See? … (he pulls cell from ear as Jimmy shouts profanities on the other side; they can be heard over the phone; ASSASSIN replaces cell to ear) … Calm down … I know they aren’t appearing together, they haven’t since King’s birthday and he upstaged her.… they’re not stupid, they won’t appear together again till they get to Lincoln’s bedroom, har-har! … who organized this thing, is his head up his . . . ? … yeah, you talk to Ace … (closes cell and goes back to watching through window) … Damn! … (cell rings) … He said what? … Well he doesn’t know his butt from a hole in the ground, tell him that for me, I was sent here to assassinate somebody, and it may just be him! … You don’t have to tell me, she’d win by a landslide, can you imagine the . . . ? … OK, call me when they’ve made up their mind … (closes cell) Shit! Shit shit! Shit shit shit! Shit shit shit shit!
(JACK ASSASSIN walks to the stage edge and addresses audience.)
JACK ASSASSIN
This is too much! The fuckups upstairs! Can you believe this? Sure you can, you’ve been around the block – (looking at woman in audience) I know you have, babe – nothing ever works out the way you plan it. But this bullshit! Well, I guess when you’re doin’ this kinda work, you gotta expect Satan at every corner … If we were organizing a peace conference between Palestine and Israel, you’d expect shit to happen; when you’re screwing an entire state to make a few bucks on your share price, like Enron did (remember Enron?), you expect things to go like a piece of cake – the world belongs to Satan, and it’s supposed to like evil, right? But it’s one thing to tackle Satan, it’s another to have to fight fuckups in your own organization. … Anyway, if you ever organize an assassination, remember to get your intelligence right, got it? That reminds me of something very pertinent in today’s news, I can’t re-… (cell rings) …. Jack Assassin. (respectfully) Yes, Mr. Ace … I understand sir, I was just waiting here for my cue, and out he came onstage … Yes, the instrument is in working order, everything’s ready … You can see it on the screen? … Yes, well Jimmy wanted me to put it on camera … You think that’s a bad idea? Well, it might slow down my getaway… Yes, sir …. yes, sir …. no, sir … no, sir … no, sir …. right away, sir …. (closes cell) … whew! … (JACK ASSASSIN unplugs the microphone and camcorder, and closes his laptop, and puts them in his backpack; Bill Clinton can be heard speaking unintelligibly over a PA system in the background) … Ace is right, this isn’t a Macworld Expo … You know what he said? He said, are you an assassin or are you a nerd? I guess you can’t be both. Not in his universe.... He has a point ….(JACK ASSASSIN watches through window; with grudging admiration:) He sure knows how to make ’em eat out of his hand …
(Long applause and cheering, followed by the chorus singing Amazing Grace)
JACK ASSASSIN
That tune always gives me goosebumps. (He watches out the window.) … Hot damn, why the hell did they have to bring him in! Now I’m confused … I couldn’t shoot him even if I were ordered to, it’s her I hate … I know, I know, Travelgate happened on his watch, but I wanted to shoot Hillary! … Now I can’t shoot anybody! … (he picks up the rifle) … What am I doing with this? …
(The chorus ends and the audience can be heard cheering.)
JACK ASSASSIN
Damn! Damn! … (to the audience) Well, what would you do? …
(Long pause.
(Resignedly, JACK ASSASSIN breaks apart his rifle and puts it in rifle sack.)
JACK ASSASSIN
There’s nobody out there I can shoot. I can’t shoot Bill – hell if I did, the whole country’d vote for her! (He heads for the door, carrying backpack and rifle pack. Half way out, he turns to the audience one last time) I’ll just have to vote for Obama! (He closes the door; at full volume, the chorus starts singing the Hallelujah chorus.)
CURTAIN

A Hummingbird in the Tenderloin

How about that?
And so far up -
In the weave of foliage of the
Tree by the window above the
Corner where homeless,
Crack heads and hookers hang
Out, waiting for their checks, being
Forsaken together –

A small object bracketed by a blur
Of wings
Zips and stills,
Hoping for a blossom
Into which to insert the soft sweet hook
Of its beak
As for nectar
Among the waving hands.

But it is too late for nectar
In these neighborhoods.
It vanishes -
A humming memory,
Briefly interrupted by sirens.

Psychologie de l’univers

The universe is a psychopath on which we fleas
Are hitching a ride – had you thought of that, smarty? -
Lees in the bottle that do not please,
Result of the impurposive wrath
Of nothingness, that other arty psychopath,
Violent, mindless, heartless, soulless, with the endless
Cunning of chance (as it were, as it can’t, as it hasn’t
Even a peanut of brain to guide it,
However superbly apposite its beautifully timed
Destructions),
Kneading us
To lusty handfuls and fardels born
Of dust
Before, or after, the battle
You cannot hope to, though you’ll forever hope to
Win,
However you saint,
Sly, cheat,
Or sin,
You’re beat,
Or I ain’t
Smarty.

Hangover: A Sonnet

The savage dance wasn't what we imagined
and the ancient warnings didn't make us free.
A smell of gas fed the sorry engine,
for better or worse, of the end of history.
Presidents came and went, dictators fell,
countries gagged on markets and grew fat,
or consumed their children in war and fire. All
churned and revolved around fear and desire. Yet
we tried to be wise, in a drunken world,
though only drunkenness seemed the appropriate way
to fit and flounder together. Both young and old,
we saluted the night even as it broke to day,
and, startled, looked at each other, disheveled, sweaty,
like gamblers putting down their final bets.

The Fierce Thanks

It was easy for you to sneer at God,
despise the weak gifts of the earth, disdain your life,
and weigh your reward in scales of empty hands:
what was harder was to pull out of the scrod
the lump of jewel the fire licked to ashes
futilely, out of mud and time
the sentient act of grace, electric water
resolved in standing bone and meat, the fire
of mind consorting with the shifting sun
and the strobing universe of dark and light
in our accident of nerves and waking dream
we call our lives: to thank the dreadfulness
and reigning chaos for its munificence,
faithful that it, like us, can know and see
and even feel out of the dark that whirled
you into vagabond being, between flies and comets.

The Ghost Fleet of Suisun Bay

Huddled like chicks on a cold morning
under the feet of the sun:
boxes of wet vacuum
squeezing into squares of shadow
under a sky smiling like a blank check:
defeated, humiliated, aging,
corpse-leaning, froglike
with dragon flies on their tongues,
pancaked into seclusion
and hypocritical nightmares
of security – like so many of us!
Mothballed veterans of the subprime,
warlike vacuities of dehiscence,
wrecks that avoided pitfalls
onto mud bank or reef
only to wallow in safety
like houseboats moored in a swamp,
they missed the grand detour
into battle, cyclone, Captain Death Wish,
the screaming myth and the headline,
they safely decline to mortality,
blankly shocked at their own squalor,
their prudent declension to death:
birthpangs
squawking behind cocktail napkins,
the perverse once witness of flocks
of frothing crows and trash gulls,
limping between the Farallons
like gimpy whales:
tucked into the seasonal bay
like a gaggle of otiose and obsolete senior citizens,
wintering for decades,
they rust and pollute and decompose and flower,
giving their discharges
like sick babies,
rotting under their nanny, the grinning sun.
The train passes them hourly, the commuters yawn,
peck at their laptops, flip through their newspapers, yawn,
check out their email, text message, dither, yawn,
glance at the ghost fleet, blink, shrug, squirm, yawn,
between the morning launch and the wreck of evening.

Nothing Like

There is nothing like growing old
to feel the tightness of the light
swaddling you like a baby, and the air
breathing in your face from the compass winds
pointing always elsewhere, and the slick
mud at your feet, in your hands, on your backside
sledding you down the backyard hill of home
in the spring thaws, coldly comforting, and the fire
that licks at the edge of the letters in your hands
from almost forgotten lovers – the smoke tartens
and bitters your nostrils with memories you would swear
were only hallucinations most of the time –
but no such luck: the fire warms the air
and dries the mud to dust that clouds the light
until the burning letters burn your hands
and you drop their frail and delicate, curling ashes
to your boots and watch they fly off like black moths.

A Bird in the Slums

Every morning for years you woke to a bird
cat’s cradling a song outside your window
in the slum building you lived in: strange word
sounding against city cement as from a country hedgerow.
Its song welcomed each day to you, you
to each day; a random, serendipitous gift,
a peculiar gift, like those of light and snow,
of wind and dew and warmth and rain, as if
the generous randomness of life itself
had settled, unseen (you never saw the bird),
outside your window, calling you awake,
calling you alive, out of the dark,
before the dawn, a witness of itself,
the flesh clothing its song as it spoke its word.