Sonnettics

I used to have a country, now it’s gone
Some asshole with a wrecking ball made sure
That nothing that was sacred would live on
They tore it down; the whole thing was a blur
I one time swore an oath that I’d defend
The country that I thought would always stand
But oaths are sometimes words that find an end
And words might not be what the asshole planned
And so they tore downs symbols of our strength
And built a pretty ballroom (wow! what balls)
I bet they’ll go to any fucking length
By tearing down they’re building bigger walls
Just wait; they’ll make your country disappear
The words and balls they swing are made of fear.

Premiere at The Tank in NYC

https://thetanknyc.org/calendar-1/gone-in-60-seconds-nyc-one-minute-theatre-festival

The Joke’s on Me
A one-minute existential play
Characters:
Ophelia – Reflective, dryly amused by her fate.
Yorick – The ever-wise fool, both guide and provocateur.
Setting:
 A liminal afterlife—vast, empty, yet oddly intimate. A single bench. Ophelia sits, wringing the water from her gown. Yorick leans against nothing in particular, grinning.

OPHELIA: Tell me, Yorick—was I mad, or was the world?

YORICK: (thoughtful) That depends. Do you prefer to be tragic or merely ridiculous?

OPHELIA: Ridiculous, I think. There’s freedom in it. Madness is such a heavy thing to carry.

YORICK: Oh, then you were utterly absurd. The prince loved you, until he didn’t. Your father shielded you, until he used you. And you, poor maid, floated prettily away—like punctuation at the end of a sentence.

OPHELIA: A comma or a period?

YORICK: An ellipsis, I think. A drowning ellipsis… trailing off mid-thought.

OPHELIA: Fitting. I always did feel unfinished. (beat) But tell me, was I real? Or just a plot device?

YORICK: Oh, real enough to drown, but not real enough to swim.

OPHELIA: (smirks) And that is the joke, isn’t it? I was shaped by everyone’s will but my own.

YORICK: (bows) The grandest absurdity of all: you were never given a choice, yet somehow, your tragedy was called inevitable.

OPHELIA: (laughs softly) And what do we call that? Fate?

YORICK: No, my dear. Theater.

Lights fade. End.

There once was some poop on the ground
It sat without making a sound
It look very fine
So I put up a sign
“Don't step on me! Please walk around.”

I saw the face of Marguerite Porete,
The mystic who beheld Divinity.
It might have been a dream, or better yet,
A vision only Seeing Eyes might see.

I wondered if she chose to thus appear
To show herself, to let herself be known.
I wondered if Divinity was near,
Or if her soul had vanished on its own.

Her gaze, a mirror burning yet serene,
Reveals a love that law cannot restrain.
A fire that stirs both absence and what's seen,
A silence singing through both loss and gain.

And in that face I glimpse the soul’s free flight,
A deathless life that shines beyond all night.