Penelope and Ulysses Page 6

  I would surrender you to them

  if you so desired.

  I want you to have joy

  and not be shipwrecked

  on the shore of quiet despair

  because you are not fully in your life.

  So tell me, Penelope,

  mistress of my senses and body,

  who do you want me to bring to you

  to keep your sanity and sexuality burning?

  YOUNG PENELOPE: I burn for you!

  I do not desire other men.

  They are not even sexually desirable to me.

  As pleasing as all the men you mentioned

  may be to many women,

  I can only think of them as my sisters.

  YOUNG ULYSSES: Come and kiss me, light of my heart.

  [They hold each other and kiss tenderly.]

  YOUNG PENELOPE: I remember that old philosopher, Socrates,

  telling me that if one is to jump

  the abyss of separation,

  one needs to be a dancer.

  YOUNG ULYSSES: Does the abyss separate us?

  YOUNG PENELOPE: No, the abyss is all around us.

  Imagine if it is all around us,

  then we are closer to each other

  than we thought.

  I sat with him under that old oak tree

  for one day and one night

  and all the time I wanted to warn him,

  to plead with him to become a dancer.

  YOUNG ULYSSES: Whatever happened to Socrates?

  Did he jump into the abyss?

  Did he finally seduce the forest nymphs

  or did they seduce him?

  Or did they consume him,

  or did political man hunt him into the ground?

  YOUNG PENELOPE: My poor teacher had to pay with his life

  for his dance with the truth of the forest nymphs.

  I learned that in order for one

  to remain above the ground

  one has to have mad dancing feet.

  I am a dancer when my nimble feet and toes

  dance on the tightrope of my life.

  I am found and lost in dance,

  “and there is only dance.”27

  YOUNG ULYSSES: Come, my wild forest nymph,

  and consume me with your dance.

  What do the shepherds

  say about wood nymphs?

  YOUNG PENELOPE: If you are lucky enough to be sexually consumed

  and burned by one,

  it is said everyone will know of your ecstasy

  for your feet will face backwards.

  YOUNG ULYSSES: Come, my wood nymph,

  and turn my feet backwards.

  Let all the world laugh and say,

  “There goes Ulysses!

  He has been loved

  by Penelope,

  for his feet are taking him backwards

  rather than forwards.”

  Is that why you desired our bed

  to be carved from a living tree?

  We built our bed around this tree.

  Did you need to sleep in the embrace of the tree

  to feel protected and cherished,

  my wood nymph?

  YOUNG PENELOPE: You carved birds and the sea

  so that when you are not with me,

  I can still sleep and wake in our world.

  I can still see what you have seen

  in your journey into the sea,

  into the sky, into the ground,

  into the fire of all shaping and forming life.

  That tree is alive.

  It still breathes and moves

  and whispers to me your secrets.

  Did you know that in certain parts

  there are trees that are

  thousands of years old?

  And in their deep silence they speak

  to the pure heart and devoted soul.

  In that carved tree

  that we have made our marriage bed

  I have given and received,

  I have had your seed grow in me.

  In that tree I have climbed

  and looked into the secrets of the sky.

  That tree we sleep on is from my home.

  This is our shared world

  and the tree will live

  as long as we feed it with the seed of our love.

  If ever life separates you from me,

  no man will come into this room

  and no man will sleep under the carvings

  that you created from the language of our love.

  No man will ever trick me,

  making me believe that he is you,

  unless he knows the intimacy of our secret.

  The key to my bed is the tree.

  The planning in my tapestry is the tree.

  The beauty of my world is the tree.

  YOUNG ULYSSES: Agape mou,

  my sweet love,

  my breath and life,

  my blood,

  if ever anyone tries to convince you

  that they are me,

  if ever the world parts us

  and you are uncertain,

  you can be sure by asking

  the man who says he is me,

  to describe the carvings.

  Ask him about the carvings

  that I have engraved to keep your dreams alive.

  I have carved the forest,

  the trees, the sky

  and even the river pebbles for you,

  my siren that seeks and finds me

  in the deepest seas of my soul.

  YOUNG PENELOPE: Ulysses, I can hear horses.

  Many horses riding towards our world.

  Can you hear them?

  An army, a plague is coming our way.

  YOUNG ULYSSES: My love, my joy,

  let me hold you to me

  before they arrive and remove me

  from you and our son.

  Hold me, for I sense

  the hunter and the net are near.

  Hold me my love.

  You cannot protect me from what is mine,

  but I am fox enough to protect you

  and our son from what is not theirs.

  You belong to no man,

  not even me, my wild bird.

  Look to your tapestry, your training, your tree

  and there you will find me.

  [The sound of horses gets louder.

  They hold each other and kiss]

  YOUNG PENELOPE: It is no other.

  It is your past decisions and actions

  that have arrived to claim you and me,

  to remove you from me.

  It is Agamemnon,

  and the blood you spilled together

  in your past and future wars.

  Shall I lay out the deep red tapestries

  or will I leave this gesture to his wife, Clytemnaestra?

  Such a king should not step on the naked earth,

  for he has soaked it with the blood of men,

  cut down in their prime,

  cut away from their lives,

  cut away from their children.

  Let him walk on the dead bodies

  that have brought him here

  and will take him to Troy.

  YOUNG ULYSSES: What have I done?

  What wolves have I killed with,

  and what wolves have I brought to my den?

  Kiss
me one more time.

  Hold me close and put your lips to mine.

  Closer, closer.

  Penelope, leave now.

  Leave me now to my past and future decisions

  and the consequences

  that they will have on our lives.

  Hide our son.

  Hide our son

  from the darkness of this barbarian,

  from this wolf

  that would sacrifice his own daughter

  to quench his blood thirst

  and his excessive appetites.

  Leave now!

  [PENELOPE runs off stage.

  ULYSSES closes the door of their secret chamber and the backdrop indicates a change of scene, into that of a white, barren, cold room.

  He awaits Agamemnon’s entrance.]

  Act III

  Agamemnon

  Colours of Blood

  “If we could end the suffering, how we would rejoice.

  The spirits brutal hoof has struck our heart

  and that is what a woman has to say.

  Can you accept the truth?”

  (Clytemnaestra)

  [The setting is outside the sacred chamber. It is a large, cold room that has a door and a window that faces the courtyard. Agamemnon is a strong, heavyset man, wearing full war armour. He has long, unkempt hair and a beard. His armour has much gold on it. He wears his sword and has some scarring on his face from the wars he has been in. His hair is dark and his eyes darker. He rarely smiles and has an air of arrogance and vanity about him. He is well trained in war, a successful politician, a successful king, a father and husband. He does not look like a monster; he actually looks human, and that is what makes him more dangerous, because one thinks they can negotiate with him and reason with him for the good of others.

  ULYSSES stands looking towards the entrance, waiting for AGAMEMNON. AGAMEMNON enters. Stage lighting red.]

  ULYSSES: I welcome you into my home, Agamemnon.

  AGAMEMNON: My good friend, Ulysses,

  what a glorious day to renew

  our old alliance and friendship.

  We have been through so much

  together, killed so much together,

  profited so much together.

  We have taken so many adventures together:

  you with your clever manoeuvring,

  and I with the might and power

  of thousands that follow us without question.

  Well, if they question we brand them as traitor.

  All the glory has been given to me

  by others, you and the gods.

  I am blessed.

  In life you have to take what you want.

  It is no good wishing for it

  or hoping for it.

  You have to take it,

  either by persuasion or force.

  A real man will never surrender

  to obscurity and notoriety.

  We both are political animals

  and we both know the weakness

  of common man,

  the need for common man to be told what to do

  and when to it.

  They can’t manage without us,

  and therefore they are there for us to use

  as we use our horses and cattle and sheep.

  Common man is there for us to exploit

  and reap the rewards of our conquest of them.

  Of course we practice civilised methods.

  We have debates and lectures and we pretend to listen

  as we portray ourselves as open

  to the opinion and welfare of common man,

  but to put into practise what they say

  would remove us from our privilege and power.

  Ulysses, you and I do not know hard labour,

  nor do we follow or obey the laws

  that confine and bind common man.

  Therefore we harvest from their toil and sacrifices,

  many things

  for our elite way of life

  that common man only dreams about.

  ULYSSES: Agamemnon, we plan and organise methods

  on how to strip the common man, the ordinary man—

  the field hand,

  the foot soldier,

  the servant—

  from his human right to live in peace,

  to harvest the seeds of his labour,

  to watch his family grow,

  to stay home

  instead of going into wars for you and me.

  Profits the collective man will not see.

  To die in a foreign shore

  with strangers and enemies,

  never to see their sons or daughters again.

  AGAMEMNON: Oh dear! My friend, you have lost your senses—

  this sentimentality for common man.

  We make history and therefore the demands

  and expectations on us are great.

  What a burden I have to carry.

  Don’t you see the weight upon me,

  carrying all these people?

  What would they do without me?

  But I would gladly carry this burden

  for the power and glory that my decisions bring to our nation.

  No more talk about this, Ulysses.

  I feel particularly good today.

  The gods have blessed this mission,

  although I had to offer my daughter to them

  to appease them.

  ULYSSES: So it is true! You have sacrificed your daughter, Iphigenia,

  for this war on Troy.

  AGAMEMNON: It had to be done.

  I have other children.

  What would you have me do—

  not follow my destiny, Ulysses?

  She was such a beautiful girl.

  It had to be done, and I did it.

  Now that takes courage.

  ULYSSES: I am truly sorry.

  AGAMEMNON: What are you sorry for?

  She wasn’t your daughter.

  Enough of this!

  Let’s speak about today.

  ULYSSES: Today has not unfolded

  and the past is long gone and buried,

  as some of our friends

  and many of our enemies.

  Why have you come to Ithaca?

  What business do you have

  among the forgotten?

  I have changed, Agamemnon.

  I am no longer the clever fox

  that stole the eggs of future generations.

  AGAMEMNON: What is this? Future generations? Eggs?

  Have you been in the henhouse too long?

  Or have you been under Penelope for too long?

  ULYSSES: The spilling of so much blood,

  it has driven me mad.

  I have nightmares

  and am not the man I was.

  AGAMEMNON: Too much blood. Too little blood.

  Does it really matter?

  ULYSSES: This is the life force of a man

  that we speak about

  and we are pouring it into the ground

  where nothing will grow for it.

  And we do it

  with indifference and contempt.

  Have we been in so many battles

  that we have become indifferent to death?

  Or are we only indifferent

  because it is not our death

  and therefore it does not affect

  our scheme and order of things?

  So I ask you again:

  w
hat business do you have with me?

  AGAMEMNON: My good friend,

  you have become philosophical and womanly

  about life and our past together.

  Philosophers and poets and women

  are no good at making decisions about life and death.

  They only talk about things after someone else

  has taken action to improve things.

  They do not have the lust to conquer

  and keep conquering others.

  Philosophers and poets and women lack the might

  to cut away the life from another.

  They have a problem with spilling a little human blood.

  They are cowards and pathetic in life.

  If we all sat around contemplating life

  like that poor Socrates,

  then I would insist that he drank the hemlock sooner.

  Such weakness in the spirit

  gives off the stench of apathy and melancholy.

  What is the matter with you, Ulysses?

  How else are we to take

  our civilisation to other worlds?

  How are we to educate these barbarians?

  How are we meant to bring enlightenment to others?

  How are we to liberate people from their oppressors?

  Therefore we must go where others fear.

  Isn’t it our responsibility,

  our duty as educated and civilised Greeks,

  to take our civilisation to others

  who are still barbarians?

  The Trojans are barbarians.

  I hear King Priam still sleeps with the goats.

  ULYSSES: This madness has taken a hold of me, Agamemnon,

  and it is this madness that makes me reply as I do.

  AGAMEMNON: What madness? This also is a weakness in man.

  ULYSSES: I have become slow and cannot think as I used to.

  Are you saying that we bring progress and liberation

  to a group of people that we invade,

  murdering their families

  and stealing their land?

  AGAMEMNON: What happened to my friend?

  What madness has possessed you?

  Don’t you remember our discussions in the past,

  about our duty and responsibility

  to civilise and educate so that we can bring our way of life

  to these oppressed people?

  I want you to come with me, my loyal friend.

  You have skills that have proven useful to me in the past

  and your skills will prove useful

  in the spread of our civilisation to Troy.

  We have fought in previous battles

  and you have proven yourself clever and shrewd.

  I have many men that can fight

  and I can use them as fodder in battle.