Persons
in the Play
THE MERMAN—a merman from the deep
sea (The Merman will do 95% of a monologue; very little dialogue).
THE OLDMAN—he looks old,
he holds a look of no threat, but there is always something devious about his
eyes. He will talk, only but a few times
with only a few words towards the end of the play, everything else will have to
be by expressions.
THE WIFE—she is seen
in the background occasionally, then she looks out the window, occasionally,
none threatening, but you see her more and more as the old man and the merman
get closer to each other. She will not speak throughout the play…other than
having the last words.
THREE CHILDREN—can be seen
in the background (occasionally be seen playing, we don’t want to take the focus
off the Merman and Old Man. The elder of the three boys will say but a few
words at the end scene. Again, most of the characters need to use expressions
to get the details of their emotions across.
DOG—in the background,
optional: he can remain in the background.
†
Scene: In front of the sea, a Merman has appeared;
in the background a beach house, with a large bay window, to the side in back
of the beach house is a garden area, where the children will appear and
disappear, as will the dog. Perhaps two younger children, six or seven, and the
older boy perhaps nine or ten. An old man, he is walking the beach front, his
wife a Peruvian, you know she’s around you can see her thorough the window, she
seems to be doing something.
Location: the location can be
anywhere of course, where there is a sea or ocean, but for all intent and
purposes, it was written with the intent it takes place off the shores of Peru,
more towards the southern part/district of Lima, off the ocean front, where
there are communities of resort houses (again this is not a necessity for the
play, just a probable location).
Note: The
play has been altered from its original narrative poetic style to be a quick
read, but still remains a play in essence.
First Act
[The Merman comes out of the water towards the
front of the Stage, he is talking out loud to himself…]
THE MERMAN
(Monologue)
The gray whales are
going south: I love their practicalities they are the great pale bulks of hot blood, that rise
and fall, rise and fall, catching the wind, unaccompanied by speech, they strangely, dogmatically, get their
message across to their kind, as the sea— turns over and over in the deep cold
waters!
None of us here,
remember our ancestors—not like those human Mammals do; you know, those that crawl
the earth! “Get out of the ocean” I
have howled, tried to tell them, time and time again, men looking for
rainbows—; they don’t love any part of the Ocean—only bring the unthinkable.
They are like half
dead eels trying to swim: that’s what I think of them; not so unlike the birds
with clipped wings, or stone clouds overhead, all malicious—
They drift like
seaweed. Heavy swollen creatures—that have taken to the sea, from time
immemorial, yet they do not belong here, or to us but they are here nonetheless, are they not—over which I see
only the unthinkable.
I come from great
ancestors, yes; I carry the great name of one, Nereus, one of the great marine
deities from long ago, called: ‘Old Man from the Sea’; which had the gift of
prophecy—
I only have instinct,
intuition—but it has served me well.
There, over there,
there is the living skull of a human Man, staring, just standing, not of the
sea, but out to sea, these warm blooded beasts have thoughts and emotions, you
know, they want to rule all the lands and the oceans, when he sees me, and I
think he does, he will cast me as a creature of the deep like “The Creature
from the Black Lagoon!
No more than that,
not allowing me any dignity. It’s funny he does not go into hysterics, like his
kind often do.
I know
there kind, They move about with thin cracking bones, white as clouds, some are black of course, others brown;
all of them bones no stronger than eggshells—; now he turns his face towards
me, for abhorrence and curiosity; I suppose his head is crammed with a
university education, filled with scientific philosophy, and hard fact of life,
soon to marvel at the wonder of me.
He can’t seem to
completely focus me in yet, but he will soon and soon he will despise me, once
he does. He will not see things
fundamentally, that is: all that is
possible, the ethereal beauty of my soul, he will say: it is not like his, and
that will be the big difference, and why he will do the unthinkable! Besides I
am older than he is, Hush, you are only a child compared to me, whoever you
are.
And if I try to
befriend him, he will only stare at me, with those great stone like eyes, run
and hide, have a heart attack. Insistently say I am not real. I am a misfit,
fish, not warm blooded.
He is no more than a
protein eaters, with erratic nerves and brain waves…
He just stares at me,
as if I shouldn’t exist; now he’ll write
something to the effect: ‘Today on the beach, I saw strange thing— a
Merman, of all things, can you beat that, but he’ll not scream it out, lest he
alter his image to his comrades.
Grow fat and die old
man: that is my wisdom for you.
He thinks I’m the
devil I bet. And he is the saintliness of all culture and wisdom, under human
purity. Yet I breathe like he does. He will say, I am immodest, a better word
might be, shameful not to wear clothes, but here in the ocean, one does not
need such items.
Beware of my teeth, ha,
ha, ha…! I am no Shark!
[You can see a
seagull Fly by over the head of the merman and hear the splashing of the waves…]
I saw a great squid
this morning, — in the deep, very deep! Must have weighted ten-thousand pounds—!
Maybe not, maybe that
is an exaggeration; perhaps only three
thousand! He was hiding under the weight of the world— just waiting, waiting,
to grab me!
Horror is here, is
what I mean, living in the ocean as I do. There is reason for his hiding, the
slime wants to eat me, as if I was a worm. But he is too slow, ugly as seaweed,
no wiser than a dumb eel, mindless, just a muddy mindless creature, soft tissue
creature creeping in the darkness of the deep— He will die soon. Another deep
sea creature will kill him for need of food, not sport.
Greatness in the Sea
Mr. Human means long life, but death
punishes many with a short one: with terror leaking and looking into
every shadowy places for its prey!
Yes, it comes to us
also, tragedies—not blood for blood but tragedies, so I blend into the seas, as
your bleed into the sands.
I feel perhaps, as
you feel, destined when I was born, now it is destined that I see for myself,
once and for all, you… Oh, yes, You who look so helpless, compel me to stop—to
take a pause: in your novels, it is called a ‘pregnant pause’, or ‘an
expectant break’ ‘lest I halt contact, and not give the mystery of man over to
the sea, although man has taught us all, here in the sea to look over our
shoulders, when it comes to man, if indeed we have them, for man to us is
faintness, a puzzling creature, but faintness, and double-hearted, headstrong,
over judgment, and scornful of self-analysis.
[There is a moment of silence; both are staring at one another—the man
and the protagonist, El Oregon]
The blood, the blood,
yours is not like ours: oh, Mother of the Sea, the Tiamat, the image of God is
here, he calls to me, perfunctorily and he forbids me to leave with that stare, and I want to stay,
out of curiosity. He stands beside the sea, his body is very erect, No! No! I
say, sink down into the waters, as long as they live I shall be only a trophy
to them or a rug in some room, they are the crowns of horror… my intuition tells me to go, can he fend off human temptation? In the sea, my kind have told me, all humans
have stained tables. If he was a poet, he’d make a sonnet of me, perhaps like
Elizabeth Barrett. I have read books from sunken ships, learned the book
language, at least to read it, but the sounds are too difficult for me to speak
it clearly: during those long days, lounging amid ships, talking over frat
affairs.
[The old man’s face
changes, from a flat effect, to holding a slight smile, a long gaze at the
Merman, a sweet small face, with a pale wild-rose color to it, with thorny
looking eyes.]
Flee away from here! Something no good will come
soon!
Oh—listen to me!
[The Merman is thinking out loud]
We have our wooded
glens, and nostalgic twilights— just like you, just different, so don’t be so
snobbish. We don’t have fire that’s about it, but we got the sun and we got
molten rock, volcanic emissions—
So put that in your
pipe and smoke it, Mr. Man! Un-kinged from the sea.
He’s looking for his camera I think. You are no different than an evil
beast with evil thoughts, evil passions—you hold inside of you. Your horns are
hidden inside your heart. You are more animal than I. You’d freeze in the
ice-cold midwinter waters of this sea—turn yellow like a parakeet.
That’s how weak you
are. Perhaps I’m jealous, I’m not sure. No oxygen down here, just salted water for
us monstrous
Beings… We are
although made of amino-acids, I think; I protect you out here. I am twenty or
thirty years more than one-hundred, and you are not the first man I saw, but I
am the first Merman you saw. I am a wonder of the world to you.
Unambiguously creature, you’re thinking I am, and
unambiguously sea-monster I must
be, —
[The old man, is
stands facing the Merman, he has never flinched, and says no wild words, says
no words at all. To the Merman he could be day-dreaming, for all that matter,
he can hear the Merman
Mumbling something,
and the language to him is gobbledygook…the old man could in all likelihood say
or shake his head as if not to understand, or a gesture from his left hand, but
he prefers not to make any sudden movement so as not to scare or startle the
creature.]
Should I submerge,
before you take that picture?
You really do not
know what I am; I see that idiotic curiosity on your face: I am the least of
the wonders, of the sea, should you take time to investigate? And you, you are
just bones on shore, and at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean…Oh, if you really
knew the power of the Ocean!
[Standing,
meditating, mumbling, talking]
Here in the ocean, we
do not take sides, like you do, in war, there are no brawlers here. Just good and evil,
that, which is common among all living things
— No, we don’t hold our
noses and compromise, cold minds, we are!
— Not Hitler’s here; we
are not without emotion… but for a few of us!
No, we do not quarrel
either, for us it is better not to strike or if necessary, strike often; but we do not
seek arms or gems, we just travel the sea, as if we were pilgrims.
Here I live among stones. Stones that have rolled
about on the floor of the sea for thousands of years. — [inattentively] Oh…Human…Did you get a good look yet?
Many stones are unlucky
they end up with the tides onto the bays of the world. I tell you these things
because you are too old to learn them on your own …
[Without much
interest the old man continues to stare, he really cannot decipher what the
Merman is talking about; he moves a foot
or two closer, his face for a moment shows deception…]
Along these shores,
these old stones fall, never again to feel the brush of water: picked up by
man, for a wall or fence, or house—who’s to say, it’s all a craving passion for
man to own something—
They love the
tide-wash, that’s what I call it. They
make me neurotic
The nausea they
provide just watching the sea, as if they were shepherds; all demagogues?
Go back to your
pitiless wars, prepare for them. Go back to your yachts— go back and hide on
your yachts, and say to your people what a Great Seaman you are. I do not wish
to think of such horrors of you dominating my world…my world, the sea!
[Flames in his eyes]
You all like to feel
our fresh air beating against your shoulders, and drunken faces. I’ve seen many
a man fall into the sea; I’ve looked straight into their eyes, they want me to
save them.
“Death,” I say to
them, cold and stern death, I whisper as bubbles come out of their mouths, with
blood in the corners:
I want to be
merciful, and even have wanted to save a few—but I don’t, I never do, their
eyes say: “You have the keys to the
reserves, to allow me to live!” Their hot young lives sinking, deeper and
deeper, fading into oblivion…
I have no absolute
enemy, wineskin old man, not even you. Who knows what crimes you’ve committed
on land— you kind have the
meanest minds of all God’s creatures!
Save them, yes, I’ve
heard tales from a few of my kind, Pale Saints I call them. When death comes, old man,
it is utter despair, darkness, extinction within these waters. Some God or
higher being, which has made us, mermen and Mermaids: most are unable to beget
a child: that is my trouble; we cannot leave heirs, so our faces grow dim to
those in the ocean once we are dead.
I tell you these
things because humans are skilled in mysteries. Are you a shark-eyed enemy in
need of absolute vengeance—you’d kill? Ah, you do not understand me at all. Anyhow,
as I was saying, about to say: they, those like me, think you are the lions of
the sea, and they flock around you when you are adrift in the sea, drowning,
and drag you to safety, sometimes to shore, and when you wake up, you think a
miracle took place, but it was our kind that saved you, not always, but often,
more often than you think. My kind will
do such things because it pleases the Creator.
†
Okay, okay, take the
picture, he sees me, take the damn picture, and get it over with!
The old man just
stands there like a goat. If I tell him to ignore me, he won’t. Go back to your house, your castle, or whatever
you call it—shed, slow-witted man! Go hammer away on the skulls of your beloved
friends, your great ideas how you’ll save the world— Stupidity! That is what it
is, his brains are squeezed, and he just wants a picture to show his friends
down at the bar!
He’s got lopsided
shoulders, perhaps other things lopsided also—I see the sea-wind makes him shiver. You’ve
got to move that hot blood about, like the whales do!
“SNAP!”
He took the picture.
Now forevermore he’ll be impressed, at the bar talking like brattling birds about
the Merman; I will be an inane, ridicules monster to them, a freak: but I am
who I am. Someone will say, some girl in the bar, will say: “Ah, look at the sad
think, such a sad poor freaky thing…!” And her boyfriend will say, will try to
be heroic, and say: “A shocking green
creature like that—they just don’t exist, you made the picture up somehow!” Then
someone else will say, a mindless drunk, will say: “Yes, he made that photo
from shadows,” as if he altered the photograph—I think they call it special
effects! That’s what they’ll all say.
Right then, right
after that short discussion, the old man will point on the photograph to this
and that: he’ll point to the starting point of
my tiny jaw, my iron gray hair—trying to impersonate: ‘The old man of
the sea…’
If only they knew my
tiresome memories, but they don’t care about them that is what I’d like to tell
them: “Waaah!” Yes, I’d cry out to
those nasty man faces, and I’d like to tell them—one and all, to get rid
of those nasty nets and all— I’d say, I do say, I’d like to say loud and clear:
I’m thinking neurotic, perhaps I have a tinge of neurosis now: I’d like to say,
I know it’s rude, but it is the only way to say it:
“No offense, get rid
of those nets, those nasty nets—asshole!”
It was not always
like this, no, not always, but those good days are gone, long gone. More people
moving west, for the splintered sunlight, I guess.
It is a matter of fact,
I have never killed a man, and never will, or expect to. Small squids have more
meat, better to kill them instead of man!
It is true I feel
some kind of dismay for man, discounting Women, I’ve never seen one. But
whales, and sharks, and eels, can make for a concerning afternoon, no weak
division here: it is their happiness: They see all life without scrutinizing of
it. They’re masked in it like crabs in sludge…
So I live, day by
day, month to month, year after year, age to age. I talk to myself, to the
moon, the stars. Even to this Man who took a picture of me, some one-hundred feet
away! The old coot, which shakes his head—yes, I’m having a one-way
conversation with him that he is unaware of! I see in the far-off distance
behind his shed, wild pigs, no not really, kids, rug-rats, must be his
grandkids he’s looking at them and then me, I nod my head ‘no’ he understands
that, he knows I’ll submerge if he does
a wrong move. Let them rattle away into
the bushes! That’s what I say.
Talking, talking, I
feel, I’m spinning a web, and he thinks he’s dreaming. Woops, I get the first big
happy grin, stirring at me I want to tell him to ram that special grin up his
nose! But I won’t. He’s just really a
pile of bones, an old rat pile of bones! With a fat belly, a foul bulk rolling
belly, he won’t have time to have old memories of me— He’s got on a blue
sweater, like the sea. Does he know we live two-hundred and fifty years, I’m at
my midlife! Years past, we’ve lived longer, desecration to the sea waters,
guess by whom? Gigantic
explosions, humans, oil spills and so on and so on!
An invisible fire is
in his eyes, not sure what they say, but should I follow my intuition, I’d
submerge, they want to talk to me: my soul can hardly resist, should I? What do you think? Guess, if I will or will
not? His fists are clinched, he wants to Growl, swim out deep into the sea with
me, and I’m only knee high in the water. I’ll crawl up a little closer, while
he catches his breath. I’m not sure how long I can remain out here, this has
been the longest of times for me—
I feel like hissing,
my mind is a little slow, I mean slowing down some, if not missing something…
I mean I’ve always
wanted to, at least one time to, just one little time, one simple time, just
one time out of a million, to talk to a man, but how long can I last outside the water,
this is the longest thus far; I’ve wanted to long ago, but didn’t. I’ve noticed
the terrible sameness these men put up with: eat, drink, sleep, bathroom, a woman
for ten-minutes, then back to some kind of work, and back to the circle that
never ends: those that pray, seem to live life better.
What’s my intuition say,
should I or should I not talk to the man: “No! Leave well enough alone.” But bleak
it is here, standing here in the water, looking at him, and he at me, and the
pale sky overhead, and each one waiting on the other one…
[The Merman is a
tinge uneasy and seemingly talking to his second- self out loud, while
examining the human.]
I could drag his old
bones out to sea—I suppose, if he tries any funny business, down into the dark
Chasms of the deep, if indeed I wanted to!
Then he’d have something to talk about. I’ve already seize him up, I
could, or the sea would, crush his bones.
I get terrified just thinking about me doing something like that: he’s
shaking his head for me not to go, to come closer! I think I’m trying to talk myself in to
believing I’m safe. What can an old man do? But one thing, I don’t want an
audience. At the same time, this is somewhat motivating, his calling me. Perhaps
he thinks he’ll snatch me, not in a thousand years, unless he is a lunatic, and
has a fit—, and if so, I’ll simply jump backwards—but I can’t take him down, my
heart is not in it…
He glances at me awkwardly, like a lizard—sneaking
up closer: foot by foot! He
thinks I don’t notice but I do.
I used to take some
pride in showing off; I was younger back then, burning with sickness and often, too
often, I’d show myself to the sailors, and they’d yell: “Look over yonder!”
That was when I moved to the deep-sea depths: to get away from all that
foolishness!
My roots go back ten-centuries.
If he wants to live
like me, he’s crazy; I live in a king’s graveyard, spread out from end to end
with unmoving nights, lest a cadaverous creature detect my sudden coming— Thus,
comes cringing stages, and lack of sleep in hushed old caves— There I sink into
silence, cross my tailfins, hope my world doesn’t end—cave-in, hope that some
shark or great eel or similar foe doesn’t invade my dingy underground room.
I live where my
unremembered ancestors have lived. We don’t have well developed memories; it
doesn’t serve any purpose for us…
[There is a moment of
silence; he seems to have gone slowly, deep
into thought…]
Yes Old Man, on one
hand it is a miserable life, in the sea, that clutches at my sleep: similar to
your greed and wars and stories
you like to boast about at the bar, that never was…but cannot find sleep
thereafter…
We stand and survive in our own putrid
environments:
Don’t ask a question please!
Act Two
(The
Scene Gets Darker)
The Scene is darker
than it was, and the wind is starting to blow you can especially see that with the old man’s
clothes, and perhaps his hair is Moving about …like a storm is approaching! The
old man’s wife is sneaking behind
he merman, slowly, everyone can see this but of course not the Merman, nor does
the husband give it away… The old man
wiggles his finger, the Merman notices but for what reason, it is beyond him,
as if he is giving a signal… Now he looks at his watch, as if he going
someplace, perhaps he is buying time. An odd expression is on the Merman’s
face—as if to say, ‘What’s up?’ The Old Man has moved in closer…
THE MERMAN
This is a joke, he doesn’t talk; if you want to talk to me old man, go
ahead and just start talking…!
[He hears a noise
behind him but pays little to no attention to it, deep in thought, the old
man’s wife is sneaking behind him…even closer now the sound is mixed with the
swish of the waves, the tide… the Wind.]
I’ll just wait here, right
here, why? That’s what he wants me to do, to wait: what is he plotting in his
deep mind? Should I talk to him, I know several languages, even his English and
his wife’s Spanish… She looks Spanish anyhow; I’ve seen her in the window
several times—of course, Peruvian I expect—since this is the Southern Coast of
Peru, I think a district of Lima, she’s younger than him by a decade or so, always
calm, but I have learned, the wife is usually like the husband, like two peas
in a pod.
Yes, I’ve come up now
and then, she’s seen me I bet, respects me, says nothing to her husband about me, otherwise
he’d not be so surprised— ten years I’ve watched her, no, it’s been twelve!
Did I say I never saw
a woman? I forgot—I have, a shadow, she’s just been a shadow to me. And every
time she’s seen me I’ve read her lips, and they’ve said, “Fair be the gale
behind you my friend, and ahead of you.”
A SEAGULL
[A Seagull flies overhead; you can hear the
wings and the wind]
Woe, woe, woe!
THE MERMAN
[He notices the seagull, and that he and the old
man are closer]
I hear my belly, it
growls, sick from that sour squid. There she peeking out the window, again: ‘Take
him,’ she says, ‘take him away so I can live in peace—’ I can’t read her lips
really, but if I were her, I’d be saying that, get rid of this old, old coot,
ram rod coot. He’s a punishment for her, that’s what I think.
[You can hear the dog behind the house, howl,
and see the children playing: they stop
to look a few times towards the old man and The Merman, not sure what they are
seeing, a bit curious. The old man’s wife has gone from the window now, the old
man is mumbling, nothing understandable. The Merman is mumbling too:]
I suppose she’s
wondering also… kick them little rug-rats in the butt! That’s what I’d do.
Theories, he’s still
on theories, whimpering, and the old goat, whining, mumbling, and groaning for
me to talk to him, such grim eyes!
His legs are swollen;
he’s a hundred feet from me now, no closer. The sky has changed. He has some
lunatic theory—he’s mumbling away, as if talking to His ear— perhaps
senility…
[The old man is really saying in a low voice,
‘Hurry up, hurry up,’ knowing his wife is coming… He is talking to an earphone
on the side the Merman cannot see.]
I’m starting to cringe, claw my flesh, I feel I should flee— I’m getting
goose bumps, if you know what I mean something’s stirring? He thinks he’s penetrated a
mystery, he has a chilly intellect, and I can say that it’s getting hard for me
to cope here!
[The old man’s wife is sneaking around the other
side, the blind side to the Merman, of the house and carrying a baseball bat.
She looks at it, as she circles around the Merman, as if: to say ‘Should I or
should I not?’ But she doesn’t stop. On the other side of the house in the
garden the children are playing with the dog, this can clearly be seen. She will
sneak up behind the Merman as he gets ready to put his foot deeper into the
water behind him, but she is there and hits him over the head with the bat; the
scene now can be darkened with stage lights on the main characters. The Merman
drops to his knees, then completely into the arms of the old man bent over as
he catches him and drags him to the sandy beach backwards: he is not completely
unconscious. The old man is now dragging the Merman onto dry sand.]
My mind is white, I
think I dropped to my knees, no I’m on my
back, and I’m on sand, he has
dragged me onto the sand, what’s he intending to do? What’s the old fool up to?
What just happened?
[The Merman is
staring up at the Old Man, amazed. He looks dumbfounded; not quite knowing what
hit him. But it was the Bat the Woman is holding in her hands, a baseball bat.
Now the old man is ripping his arm off his shoulder—it’s now off. The Woman is
waving her hands behind him; the Merman looks at her, sees the bat, his face says: ‘how did she get here so quick…?’ Blood is
Pouring out of His Upper shoulder. The kids start to edge forward, and then run
down to the seashore.]
The kids are running
down to see me what is taking place… I got to think quickly: think, think quick
and straight! I’m really going to die, he thinks he can— the cold blooded
Beast! Do me in! I can’t even cry out for help, who will help
me…?
“Helppppp!”
THE OLD MAN
[The old man is now looking down at the Merman, who
has a doubtfully looking face, hoping to persuade the approaching children it was
as he is going to say, an accident, the arm being ripped off. The elder boy
approaches, while the other two boys retreat somewhat.]
Look, it was an
accident…! ~
THE MERMAN
[The Merman looks up, slightly awake looking
sharply at the old Man mumbling to himself, ‘Death is here, and death is here’.
Turns suddenly to the Boy…]
Liar, he’s just wants me to die, for you to be calm, for the children to
be calm.
[The old man is
overturning him like an infant, like a Tossed Fish!]
THE MERMAN continued
[The old man is silent, and then the Merman says
slowly]
I’ll bellow out, yes that’s what I’ll do: “Help!
Please help…!”
My English perhaps isn’t that entirely good, first
time I’ve ever used it! [He
mumbles.]
[Now everyone but the
Merman remains frozen in their ways while the Merman talks out loud but he is
really just thinking…the merman doesn’t move during his thinking
process—stares; the dog is out of sight.]
The blind mindless,
old coot—what’s he up to. He thinks I’m a demon, no just an odd mindless sea
creature. He’s tying my other hand around my waist, tight against my torso,
with his twisted shirt! ~
THE OLD MAN
An Accident, it was
really just an accident…I pulled too hard I guess, and it just came off!
[He Merman is laying on the sand painfully.]
THE MERMAN
[He mumbles.]
Then why is he doing
what he is doing? He’s taking another picture of me, for god’s sake, what is
his problem, his game?
[He mumbles. No one
can hear him clearly, and that can be clarified because no one is paying him
any attention…]
[Now everyone but the Merman remains frozen in
their ways gain, while the Merman talks
out loud but he is really just thinking…the Merman doesn’t move during his
thinking process—Stares; still the
dog is out of Sight.]
Blackness, I’m
feeling a dark power moving over me [dim the lights], I’m falling into a deeper dread,
I’ll tumble into death I know that now—any Minute now.
Wait, no, my sight is
getting better [he looks to his side
notices blood is all underneath him]. My
blood: I gave him what he wanted, a smile, a moment, a picture, and now we are
old friends. Yet my heart bangs with terror. He’s just standing there, his wife
calm as a winter breeze, mindless as well. Watching me die.
He’s one of those
that go to church guys, for the sake of appearance, he’s a show and tell hypocrite,
a house that looks over the sea, and he does this to me! For I am of the sea. He is feeling joy for
his captured creature—he will boast this evening at the bar. He’ll be in the
paper tomorrow. I am his animal, his prized fish. They will all enjoying the
story how he struggled the sea monster and overcame it, and hold the listeners
spell found.
Then someone will say: “Poor, creature,” I hear one
of the kids say, that in a whisper…
[The elder boy in the background has said a few times, in a near whisper: ‘The poor creature,’ the Merman has mimicked
him…]
THE OLD MAN
[Now standing over the Merman very quietly,
looking at the elder boy, and the two children behind him, his wife now on the other
side of the Merman near his end…, dropping the bat, with flinching hands to her temples…]
He had an accident, it is better to put him out of
his Misery...!
THE MERMAN
[He mumbles.]
I am of the Sea! Yet
I die on sand! I am just a visitor here…how empty sand can be I knew it before
I felt it—dry sand, no wild creature could have done this to me, I hated you
then I loved you and tried to understand you, now I have no time for love or
hate only to make my peace with the Creator!
[The Merman’s head is bobbing in
dizziness…][And the sand becomes a
faded brown and the winds start blowing, and all that was still in
Nature seems to be aroused, it is as if the old man has taken one natures
sacred creatures: He remains laying on the gravel, like a dying leaf—no: like a
dead leaf!]
THE WIFE
[The wife starts
walking around the body towards her husband, looking sharply at her husband,
quietly looks at the children, disheveled And shaking, it is getting windy and
cold, and dark….looking strangely into the air as if she was one of the
soldiers that had Crucified Christ, an innocent creature, as if she and her
husband and children will now be subject to misfortune.]
You caused these
things, you and your fancy to have a price fish, tell me at least: well we get
misfortune for what we have done?
Perhaps this creature was the sort that only God has a right to destroy.
[Then she looks out to sea, hears the roaring of thunder and that of a nearly inaudible, but huge wave: crushing
waters it is twilight now. The winds can be heard, she says:]
Something is
coming? Something is running at us! And it sounds deadly frightful, could it be
a Big Wave?
[Everyone is standing
and looking out to sea, and the lights go out on stage as if in the house, and
in the house, and everything is quiet, silent, but the thundering of a giant wave
forthcoming, and the curtain goes down….]
The Curtain Goes Down
†
The End of the Play
History of the Play/Drama
History Drama
Notes 1: This story has a tinge of truth to it, Robinson Jeffers,
the great poet of the 1920s, once claimed he saw a Merman, off the coast of
Carmel, California, and mentions it briefly in his poetic narrative verse,
thus, this author, and poet, Dr. Siluk who once lived in both Northern and
Southern California (in the late 1960s), was somewhat inspirited to write his
epic style poetic narration on the subject of a “Merman,” and has put it into a
poem, although this is the third identification he has gotten concerning this
legendary figure; and then thereafter, put it into a play.
History Drama
Notes 2: Also, when the author was in Colombia, Bogotá, at
the national museum, November, 2005, he
saw the drawing of what was seen in 1642, of a Merman they called Orejón, or in
English ‘Big Ears’ also along the Coast of California. The author having only
pen and a notebook at hand drew what he could of the figure freehand and
quickly, since pictures were not allowed; and colored it in with two shades of
green, according to the eyewitness’s observations. In which he had long ears,
naked for the most part, web-feet, and a human looking head. The author’s
original drawing is one the front cover of this book.
History Drama
Notes 3: Again, when the author was in Malta, in November,
2001, the author read and heard local stories of a Merman spotted in the 14th
Century off the Mediterranean Coast of one of the three islands of Malta, in
which a group of gypsies lived, and often times observed from a distance, whom
indicated: its flesh was of tints of green, although their description was more
on macabre side of life.
History Drama
Notes 4: General Information: hence, the
legend of the Merman seems to keep coming up. And so the author has taken to
heart all these past experiences, and secondary encounters and created a
horrific modern tale out of this unproven legend—one may even consider it, the
unknown star: bringing the Merman a little farther down the coast of
California, to the Southern Shores of Peru, where he has also been, and most
likely the Merman would have traveled anyhow: and where it would seem more
logical for the Merman to have been seen, and renaming it, The Legend of
Orejón, which
seems most befitting, and proper.
In
passing, let me say there is also a legend out of the jungles of Satipo, where
a mermaid lives to this day, near a waterfalls, which the author has written a
short story on called, “The Legend of the Ghost-fish,” since the creature
cannot be completely identified one-way or the other as to its appearance other
than a large fish, or creature sitting on a rock near the falls, and seems to
swim in the deepest part of the waters under the falls, and seemingly is more
fish like than Merman or Mermaid. Again, the author has been in the Jungles of
Satipo, but has not verified this legend beyond hearing the story by an
eyewitness, who has seen the creature as he swam under the falls, into those
deep waters, and was being sucked into its muddy like quicksand, thus pulling
himself out in time, before the creature could devour him, which he claims was
at least his size, and its head more fishlike (encounter was in: 2011).
