INCEST PLAY - Pearly Freedland
A NOTE ON STYLE:
This play transverses styles, switching between metered rhyme and smutty, colloquial free verse. This is an intentional choice—my desire here is to call into question the canon, to prod at the sutures of the stylized plays of the past. Words are a form of music, but as we catapult further into Late Capitalism, as we understand that we are responsible for our own destruction, what type of music are we trying to create? What does meter, rhyme, and the poetic constraints of the English canon serve to do? Does it make us nostalgic for the music of the past? Does it serve as a beautifying aesthetic? If so, then why do we continue to strive for beauty in the midst of so much collective self-annihilation? My goal, therefore, is disorientation. I want dissonance. I want irony and for the metered, more poetic sections to be presented in an ironic, effete manner that serves as pure delusion. Only the smut is clear and illustrious. The smut is reality.
CHARACTERS:
SISTER 1:
Two years older,
loud and a bon vivant.
Knows how to love herself,
but desires death more.
SISTER 2:
Quiet and yielding,
self-deprecates with
kindness;
Would kill if necessary.
SOPHIA:
Witty and effete, truly
one of a kind, lives
by the aphorism “don’t
dream it, be it.”
CHORUS:
A band of demons,
a touch ugly but
DRIPPING in
sex appeal. Intermittently
will do bumps of ket
mid-sentence.
PLACE:
Set in the Great Lakes Region, in
any town not on a lake—landlocked and rusting,
save for the lazy red river (St. Dupree)—and New York City.
any town not on a lake—landlocked and rusting,
save for the lazy red river (St. Dupree)—and New York City.
TIME:
Shifting between now, or—
the impending apocalypse—and, the past, or—
a complex intimacy
the impending apocalypse—and, the past, or—
a complex intimacy
SCENE 1
SISTER 2 wakes up from a dream,
sweat percolates on her forehead in drops. She
bolts up from the bed placed mid-stage,
alone and engulfed in darkness except
the one spotlight illuminating her.
sweat percolates on her forehead in drops. She
bolts up from the bed placed mid-stage,
alone and engulfed in darkness except
the one spotlight illuminating her.
SISTER 2
I am dreaming of her again, my Sophia,
deluding in that relation broken. Longing this
dead thing I
grieve,
her with one of her lovers—me
who took myself from that knowing—
her and her lover,
wearing pup masks—
me,
voyeur,
observing as you licked and
lapped blue jays from
each other’s mouths.
Lights go out.
Lights come back on and the CHORUS stands in
one line. For this scene, each devil speaks about two sentences, and
either mid-sentence or end of sentence, snorts some ket,
and passes the bag on to the next demon.
Lights come back on and the CHORUS stands in
one line. For this scene, each devil speaks about two sentences, and
either mid-sentence or end of sentence, snorts some ket,
and passes the bag on to the next demon.
CHORUS (at certain points the demons volley questions at each other, and this is denoted with “-”)
- Ah, SISTER 2. Messy bitch, haha.
- Isn’t she the one who started to fuck her sisters’ soon to be roommate?
- Sure did, the little slut.
- While she and her sister continued to play out their dom/sub rope bunny kink dynamic?
- There’s a special place in hell for freaks like her. (Makes a heart with
its hands.)
- Yet she broke it off after four weeks…
- Well, Sister 1 was not pleased. After a week she calmed down but it was enough to send that young Sister 2 to heaven and you know the bullshit they’re serving up there, Original Sin and all that.
- Damn, I thought that humans were getting over “good” and “evil.” Like hello! The world is ending! Just fuck who you want and have fun before Mother Earth kills you!
- Oh, give her a break. She was young and still wading through a lot of childhood shit. She still had a lot to learn about navigating queer relationships.
- She really went a bit nuts though, once she regretted her choice… The demons snicker.
- It was kind of epic, though, don’t you think? Possession meets Kill Bill. Those remain some of the most delectable images of human depravity.
- Should we end our collective monologue with some cryptic words that leave the audience hot, bothered, and wanton?
- What else are we here for?
Demons clear their throats and say in an effete manner, in unison:
And so, in that moment of destruction, she beheld it, her power, but the months, and years, that followed would forever torment her, and the hate she felt towards herself got redirected towards her sister—now living, now loving this ex—ballooned until all that felt appropriate was death, but not necessarily her own.
The CHORUS howls
the wail increases
until it buzzes
to blackout.
the wail increases
until it buzzes
to blackout.
Scene II
The CHORUS stands on stage right, back stage
while our sisters who are young
stand stage left, front stage
stripped of all clothes except
1 dollar bills
covering their sex.
while our sisters who are young
stand stage left, front stage
stripped of all clothes except
1 dollar bills
covering their sex.
CHORUS
On the shores of St. Dupree
a particular lore
of two sisters fated
of most sickening love—
a story of desire left unabated.
The weakened humus of the forest’s floor
foreshadowed a culture in decline.
Cats darted with the devil,
townspeople retched
at this ludicrous level
two sisters stooped,
with Beezlebub and Lilith.
We open our scene
at the top of the stairs
where two young girls lean
with dollar bills on their sex,
pulsing like rhythmic rats
as an energy booms
from mycelial cells
of a shared womb.
The sexes throb,
hips gyrate,
all a slick design of bate
for the babysitter’s attention
they wish to sate.
Two whore children—
it’s always about daddy—
you (CHORUS points to the audience)
do not judge
their fiction.
SISTERS 1 & 2 (in unison)
We bear witness to
our prepubescent sacks,
hollow with warmth,
the end of our days as fossil fuels
burn bright, the
algae bloom of carbon
blankets the stones of this river
furry like our father’s back,
my little ape, that's our
mother’s coo—
my little ape, she tells
him. This monotonous
monogamy, this nuclear
family of state control
tells us 24 hours in
a day 365 days
in a year; moralizes
our love,
our tiny
pricks, oh, but aren’t
pricks
enlarged clits?
These dollars which conceal our sex,
are sex?
Babysitter… are we beautiful?
Our burlesque
to keep this life which drags
in this house, our
grave. To be free! Let
us rave! Life may get
better this love is our
alter
clove and myrrh bookended
time, the weekly sabbath our
presence… do you love
us? We put on a
good show.
Lights fade to black.
Scene III
In New York City, SISTER 2 in a shibari bind while
SISTER 1 circles her with a paddle in hand.
SISTER 1 circles her with a paddle in hand.
SISTER 2
Dear sister
please loosen this knot
for it takes from my
pleasure.
SISTER 1 loosens
the cutting
knot.
the cutting
knot.
SISTER 1
When you and Sophia kissed
I felt love’s death
in my body
bereft.
SISTER 2 (to herself)
If only I had known
there is the devil in love,
I would’ve been
more kind and held
her closer.
SISTER 1 (with consenting concern)
Does it feel better?
SISTER 2
Yes, my love.
SISTER 1 wields the paddle
as her desire
overcomes.
as her desire
overcomes.
SISTER 1
I have toppled towers,
unperturbed in grace,
as you walk
without knowledge
of violence. I will make this
known to you.
SISTER 2
Let it be so. My soul grows
for you.
A primordial injustice, our
parents’ restraint
I escape
and must accept this lot
in faith.
The CHORUS emerges
From the background.
From the background.
CHORUS
To what end must they
suffer?
Humankind and their self-obsession,
a taxing lure.
Scene V
SISTER 1 blindfolds SISTER 2,
flips her on her stomach and
bends her ass into the
air, prodding her sex with her hands and
feeling SISTER 2’s hole.
flips her on her stomach and
bends her ass into the
air, prodding her sex with her hands and
feeling SISTER 2’s hole.
SISTER 1:
You little slut,
how does this feel?
SISTER 2:
No response except soft wail
SISTER 1:
I asked, how does this feel?
SISTER 2:
Good, sister, good
SISTER 1 takes a paddle and softly rubs it against SISTER 2’s ass, then spanks her hard until
SISTER 2 cries out
SISTER 2:
Oh, yes, oh, owww, oh sister!
SISTER 1:
Your pain is irrelevant.
SISTER 1 slaps her again. She takes a dildo and shoves it into SISTER 2’s hole.
SISTER 1:
How does that feel?
SISTER 2 cries in pain, and SISTER 1 takes rope and gags SISTER 1’s mouth.
SISTER 1:
Tell me you’ll never fuck around with that bitch again.
SISTER 2 spits out words, gagged
SISTER 1 rhythmically slaps SISTER 2’s buttocks, and with each strike, SISTER 2 squeals out OW, OW, OW in a crescendo until
SISTER 2:
UNDERTOW, UNDERTOW
SISTER 1 stops. She gets off from the couch and lights a cigarette.
SISTER 1:
What did it this time?
SISTER 2:
Pain and paranoia. The thought that you might fuck Sophia.
SISTER 1:
I have no interest in that. We live together. Your paranoia is a dangerous tool. I’m sorry you think this way.
SISTER 2:
You will betray me.
SISTER 1: (scoffs)
After your betrayal, it's only fitting.
SISTER 2:
I can’t do this anymore. I have to leave.
SISTER 2 begins to gather her clothes, strewn across the stage. She looks at SISTER 1 before she leaves and begins to cry.
Lights fade to black.
Pearly Freedland grew up on Potawatomi lands/northern Indiana and now resides on Lenape lands/Brooklyn. A Rabbi's kid, she's a witch and a budding herbalist dedicated to the liberation of Palestine and the Earth's forests. She looks forward to the day when she lives off-grid. Previous work has been published in Spectra and forthcoming in smokeandmold.