Ambiguity and Truth

(A poem in one-act. Characters: Ambiguity and Truth, )

 

 ( Light slowly goes on Truth, standing in rear of center-Stage  at a waist-high potter’s table with clay to make a  cup    …he is constantly molding it.

 

Back-stage right… is a loud mixture of barroom gaiety of men & women, and an occasional burst of argument.

 

(Ambiguity enters right… from the sound of the crowd, embracing Truth, the sound diminishes in soft background noise )

[Ambiguity:]

 

How can I begin to insist upon

Your ears listening to a silent crowd;

Ability to speak above that sound,

Enlightened, without a sinister shroud?

Cacophony does seek meaningless sound.

Sometimes, but not often, harmony finds

Acceptance, sliding itself gently down

To resistant soul and in open minds.

(Ambiguity grabs the shoulders of Truth, pulling his right ear, whispering)

 

Fruitlessness and fruitfulness are akin

In the measure of wisdom’s balance scales;

As silence and the spoken word are twin.

Each undeclared, if truths intention fails.

 

I, will persistently speak within you;

As Ambiguity and truth will do.

 

 (Truth shirks  Ambiguity off his shoulders)

[Truth]           

 Speak neither of me, nor of you this day.

The sigh of shame is louder than whisper.

You have come and gone, beyond what you say.

You shake me, shook me within this murmur

Of finding your faults paled by bright spotlight;

Masking attributes, blinded from honesty,

Ultimately discovered without night,

On the stage of a bastard’s travesty.

 Crushed by wheels and heels of mind’s illusions

You are stubborn, are strong in your dogma.

Actions forgetting strength of decision

Of what things are and what is in drama.

 

 I will not sway for your understanding;

Abstract transition, false apprehending. 

 

(Ambiguity grabs Truth by the legs)

 [Ambiguity]

Love me for my strong probabilities,

Fall so you can bruise in discouragement! 

To explain yourself without jealousies.

Fall you mother fucker in compliment!

 

(Truth side steps Ambiguity, untangling his legs)

[Truth]

Get up from that muddling in empty space.

What do you find in disguised innocence

That exposes anger in demur  face?

Align yourself without permanence.

Release your embraced convulsive action;

Such foam with disgrace of uncertainty

Burst into small bubbles of reaction

Floating in distasteful banality.

 

You have found your colorful residence

Excreted in loud and boisterous façade

Among the reeds and weeds of ignorance

Rippling in reflection of a mirage.

 

Silence Ambiguity, I agree

I cannot be, without you being seen.

 

(Both exit hand in hand back-stage right… into rising loud mixture of barroom gaiety of men & women, and an occasional burst of argument).