By Kerry Shawn Keys
The Plant, in this case an Atomic Plant. For me, it was Three Mile Island which almost experienced a meltdown in 1979. I was living in hill country nearby, maybe 30 kilometers the way the crow flies. Deadly close, and no one knew what to do, no one was prepared. People, including me, scattered to the four quarters. I was working in the garden at the time and heard the news on my radio that was on the steps. This is the grounding for these 3 pieces---the characters are entirely fictitious, though the backdrop isn’t. It was a dark time, and soon a cynical time due to authorities lack of action and stonewalling of protests. In response, these dark tales, which I wrote years later here in Vilnius. I first composed the prose piece. Then, took it into a monologue for the stage. In the third, I added two actors. The tale changes in each – these are more than adaptations. They became new pieces, though the monologue and “Trio” are pretty similar. The prose tale for the page, the two scripts for the theatre. For me and for a certain school of critics, it is interesting to see how the plot is worked out, the embellishments in each, process guessed at, the final work. I thought of publishing these in Lithuania now that two toxic nuclear reactors will be boxing in the country, and the older one at Ignalina in a state of disarray. I hear the decommisioning work has stopped due to the Wuhan Virus, and so many elderly workers.
THE PLANT
I was in the garden trying to remove all the slugs that had infested the lettuce overnight. It was rather early for me to be out there, half-asleep, attempting the impossible. But it was a beautiful morning, the maple and oak trees so green, the sun draped in fleecy scarves of clouds that would flap across its face and then swim in the blue around it. Everything was a paradisiacal cliché, but to my mind hardly banal. Birds were also everywhere – on the fencepost and in the lilac, some in the grass looking for bugs or worms, others in the woods at the bottom of the slope and singing, just singing in the dark canopy. I was just spooning slugs, tedious work with no joy in it like when one overturns the soil, crumbles it, and plants the seeds, or when the seeds are bearing vegetables and the stomach’s growling with anticipation. My wife was in the kitchen, making coffee, maybe listening to the radio. Probably, she was still wearing her nightdress, her lamb-skin slippers, her hair down, her slender fingers playing with a spoon. We had it good. We were in love. It was always Spring.
The road above our place at the top of the hollow, was dirt. The township authorities kept vowing to pave it to make a few bucks on the side, but we kept putting stumbling blocks in their way. All of the neighbors agreed on that – we didn’t want asphalt with all the hotdog cars and roadkills it would bring. Dust was preferable. We didn’t have any kids yet, but we could imagine them running anywhere in the woods or fields without fear of city traffic or teenagers bent on the high of speed and death. We thought we’d have a baby soon, but that would have to wait until we had a better income.
You know how it is when you don’t want to dig in, bite the bullet, and take on the responsibility of a nine to five job and getting up every morning to face diapers rather than the sunrise.
The slugs were a real bitch. That organic, tiny particle glass worked on them, but I didn’t have any handy. I decided that that night I would put jar lids with beer all over the garden to trap them, and see if their numbers were finite. If not, I wasn’t prepared to do it every night, since it was nearly as much work as scooping them off the lettuce one by one. Though there was something pleasantly satisfying to see them dead and drowned, almost melted into a pile, and waiting for you to put them all in a bucket and throw them into the compost. Picking them up one by one and doing the same, left me tired and a little squeamish, and, I admit, more like a murderer than the steward of Providence of the night before technique, a little tipsy with the gift of beer. I wasn’t even particularly fond of lettuce, but my wife was. She was probably finishing up her coffee, and getting ready to come out and join me.
The morning was a bit unusual. A few pickup trucks had come down the road with huge piles of plastic sheets billowing in the back. Roped down. You could hear the ragged ends fluttering. Suddenly, my wife came running down the steps from the porch to the garden, her hands aflutter and shouting that we needed to clear out pronto. She seemed confused and scared. I was just confused. I didn’t quite get at first what she was saying. Then it became clear – the plant downriver was in danger of a meltdown. It was about 20 miles away the way the crow flies. Over the gap at the top of the mountain and in the valley. She said she hadn’t been listening to the radio as usual, but had only then turned it on to hear the news. Just then, we heard some more trucks coming. I shouted for her to go up to the road and flag a truck down, and ask what was going on. I gathered up the garden tools in a slow, constrained panic, not sure what to do. Then I heard a gut-wrenching scream from the road, and turned to see her body rolling under the fender and wheels of a truck. It just dragged her like a ragdoll, and then coughed her up on the berm about 30 yards down the road. Never stopping. All of this was in a split second. I ran up to the road, choking and spitting up, and then the neighbor lady came along in her car at the same time. She stopped, but we both saw at an instant that it was too late. She was also in a panic, as we pulled the body off of the berm into the weeds next to the mailbox, where we propped it up. As if the sitting position would bring her back to life. I vomited on a redbud all tangled with poison ivy. Another truck whizzed by with what seemed like Abraham’s tent of plastic in the back. My neighbor sputtered out that she had spoken to one of the drivers a few minutes before, and that they were taking the plastic to the local schoolhouse basement, which also served as a bomb shelter, stocked with canned food, Geiger counters, and even beer. They had heard that if they covered the ceiling and walls with plastic it would prevent the radiation from coming in. My hands were slick with blood, and what looked like squashed slugs. My wife was wearing her green slacks, and her wedding ring glistened in the sun. I put my fingers to her pulse – not even the rabbit-beat of a heart. She was warm as anything. The spoon for the slugs was sticking out of my pocket. Funny, how you notice all of these tiny details at such moments. The red flag was still up on the mailbox, like a poppy on a headstone. I wasn’t crying, but I spit up again.
We left her there. There was no where to put her, and I didn’t know what I was going to do. Going to the schoolhouse seemed out of the question. I didn’t believe in that plastic story the locals were so sure of. They believed in God. I didn’t even believe in dinosaurs. I decided just to run back inside and hole up with the radio. My neighbor asked me why in the hell I wasn’t rushing to the schoolhouse. I told her I didn’t believe in that bunk. And then she came out with it – she didn’t either. Her eyes were all lit up like she was burning inside – like the Passion and Apocalypse combined. I said to her I’m really scared, much more than it shows, why don’t you come in a minute and have some coffee, and we can maybe think of what to do. She nodded. I turned and took a quick look at my wife propped up under the red flag, blood all over her slacks, and over her face….like she had slopped on too much lipstick for a Carnival party. She was clutching her silver coffee spoon. Then we just hightailed it down to the house and sat in the kitchen huddled around the radio. The coffee was still warm, as if prepared for us. Then the announcement came – it was just a test! The authorities were seeing if their evacuation system was in order, if folks were prepared, and saying that they had deliberately not sounded any sirens, just to see how other systems would work – like TV and radio and word of mouth. I turned off the radio in disgust. You could have heard a pin drop as we looked at each other in utter relief, though still trembling. Suddenly we embraced – I don’t know why – and sat down on the sofa. The slugs were still in the garden, I guessed. I wasn’t. I could hear my neighbor’s car purring and puttering up on the road. The sunlight through the window hit a little crystal I had dangling there, and a rainbow of light swung back and forth across the room. Already, I could see some buzzards out the window, circling. They’re quick buggers. Yeah, we took off our clothes, and now the prism was fluttering on her breasts. I bent and kissed them both, my tongue lingering over the engorged red buds of her nipples. I glanced down at the floor and saw the spoon that must have fallen out of my pocket. Speechless, our bodies nearly melted into each other. The rest is the usual story.
THE PLANT
Monologue Stage Script
Except for one brief moment, the only visible character in this Monologue is HE, though SHE does appear as a dummy-manikin propped against the mailbox. HE does reply and converse with a SHE and WOMAN though they don’t speak.
Some part of the song, Tennessee Waltz, can be heard from inside the house, and then the channel turns to some unintelligible news, which grows fainter until HE speaks.
HE (he is in garden working, sleepy looking, and muttering aloud) Goddamn slugs come in and creep their slime over the lettuce every night. Eat me and my mother if they could. One after another ad infinitum, I’ll never get you all. Fuckin’ beautiful morning, though, maple and oak so green. Look at that sun with the clouds flapping across its face, swimming in the big blue. Hey Mr. Sun, nice fleecy scarves you got, and me here in my dirty rags. You look like Paradise, and I could be Mr. Banal – both of us clichés. Birds everywhere (whistles trying to imitate and talk to a bird) – fencepost, in the lilacs, those over there in the grass fussing for bugs and worms. And some there in the woods singing, just singing away buried in the branches and leaves. And me, I’m a slug spooner, just spooning slugs buried in tedium like a machine working an assembly line. Bad back but I’d still rather be overturning the soil, crumbling it, planting. (all the time he’s talking he is off and on stooping and picking slugs and plopping them in a bucket) Wife’s in the kitchen, guess making coffee, listening to the radio. Probably, still wearing her nightdress, lamb-skin slippers, her hair down, her slender fingers playing with a spoon like she used to like to play with my cock now and then. We got it good. Love. Luv. Loo. Always Spring (says this a bit ironically and smirks) How does it go? – summer is the crudest season, bleeding lies out of the dung…and little Lulu’s bung.
Road above our place at the top of the hollow is dirt. Township assholes keep vowing to pave it to make a few bucks on the side, but we keep putting stumbling blocks in their way. All of the neighbors agree on that – we don’t want asphalt with all the hotdog cars and road kills it would bring. Dust’s preferable. Babies eat it when they’re deficient in some minerals – like this. ( He sticks a small stone in his mouth and spits it out and grins) I ain’t no baby, just pretending to be Cicero and understand my fuckin’ King’s English as best I can, even if I am full of shit. We don’t have any kids yet, but we can imagine them running all around the woods or fields without fear of city traffic or teenagers bent on the high of speed and death. My wife wants a baby, but that’s gonna have to wait until I have a better income. You know how it is when you don’t want to dig in, bite the bullet, and take on the responsibility of a nine to five job and getting up every morning to face pissy diapers rather than the sunrise. Not that I like getting up at all, just getting’ it up. Always afraid she’s gonna go off the pill, though, without telling me.
Slugs are a real bitch. That organic, tiny particle glass stuff works on them, but I don’t have any handy. Boy, I hate picking these things. Tonight I’m gonna put jar lids with beer all over the garden to trap them, and see if their numbers are finite. There’s something pleasantly satisfying to see them dead and drowned, almost melted into a pile, and waiting for you to put them all in a bucket and throw them into the compost. If it doesn’t work, I’ll just continue picking them off one by one. Spooning them up one by one makes me a little squeamish, and, I admit, more like a murderer than the steward of Providence of the night-before technique, a little tipsy with the gift of beer. I’m not even
The Plant
Script 2.
particularly fond of lettuce, but my bitch is. Pardon your slip of tongue, Sir. My wife. She’s probably slurping up her coffee, and getting ready to come out and join me in the workforce. (He yells an aside in a direction away from the house – “ Hi honey, Adam’s waiting in the garden with the worm. Got some Golden Delicious for you too .”)
(He looks up toward the road) A bit unusual this morning. These pickups coming down the road with huge piles of plastic sheets billowing in the back. Roped down. You can hear the ragged ends fluttering like a cage of wings on crack.
HE Here she comes, running toward the garden, hands fluttering like falling rain. Boy, she looks scared. No nightdress – look at those green slacks and that oversized gooseberry wedding ring I got her. Still holding her coffee spoon. What?! (he looks confused) On the radio. What’s that? Right away? Out of here…nuclear plant meltdown. Shit! Yeah, let’s go!
HE Okay, go up and flag down a truck and ask what’s going on. I’ll get the keys to the car. ( Sound of trucks coming down the road, and the sound of screeching brakes) (He trips over the bucket of slugs on his way to the house and then returns just in time to hear a gut-wrenching scream from the road) ( and now a dummy rolls on the road like a ragdoll all covered with blood)
HE Hon Hon, oh my God! (he’s running up to the road, choking and spitting up) (No actual truck but a truck door built into a backdrop. Truck door opens)
WOMAN’s VOICE and HE in Unison God! God! No chance. Fuck. Like a roadkill. Fuck. (He pulls the body off the road to the berm and props it up in the weeds against the mailbox)
HE Heavy huh? Like dragging a deer. God! Thanks. Let’s set her up, sit her up, maybe she’ll come to. (He gags and vomits in the weeds)(sound of other trucks whizzing by) Jesus, another fuckin’ truck with Abraham’s plastic tent in the back! Hon! Hon! (while saying this he looks first at his dead wife and then next to himself) What’s that? Plastic’s going to the high school basement, a bomb shelter? that’s what I hear. I know years ago they put canned food there, Geiger counters, six-packs even. Stale for sure now. Now I remember, they say if you cover the ceiling and walls with plastic the radiation don’t get in. Sounds like a bunch of shit to me.
HE Fuck, look at my hands, blood and slugs. Shit. (Goes over to dummy- wife) Look at her ring, pulsating like one of those little strobe toys for kids. (He bends and takes her pulse) Not even the rabbit-beat of a heart. Warm as anything. Hon Sweetie. ( the spoon he was scooping slugs with can be seen sticking out of his pocket) (Unaware of what he’s doing, he lifts up the red flag of the mail box, pulls the spoon out of his pocket, puts it back, and then convulsively gags and vomits over his dead wife)
The Plant
Script 3
HE Just gonna leave you here honey. Forgive me. Don’t know what else to do. We gotta get inside somewhere, but not the schoolhouse. That plastic shit is bullshit anyway.
God, the locals even believe that God comes to their church suppers. (Turns and speaks next to himself) Let’s go hole up in the house until…
No, I’m not going to the school. Don’t believe in that bonk. You neither? Good. Yeah, if you got some wine in the truck, go get it, we’re gonna need to blitz our brains.
HE You okay? You look like you’re burning, like the Spirit’s in you. (spot and stage lights create a kind of glowing hologram—he stares and stares at it for about 12 seconds)
I’m scared. More than it shows. Feels like the End. Let’s go down, down inside. Coffee. Fuck yes coffee… I can’t think. (he turns and stares at his dead wife) Blood, blood all over you like a bucket of runny lipstick…still clutching your silverware coffee spoon. Come on, let’s hightail it down there. (lights go out for about 15 seconds while stagehands bring in kitchen table, shades drawn shut, sofa, silverware box on sidetable near door, pot of marigolds, radio, a not too large nor very conspicuous, framed painting (1612-1618) by Artemisia Gentileschi of Judith, her maid, and Holofernes on wall of room, some apples on the table, sickle hanging from a nail on wall near door, other furniture, props)(lights come on and he’s huddling, listening to the radio) Coffee’s still warm like it was waiting for us. Give me a slug of that wine.(radio blurts –“ just a test, testing local systems, just a test”, etc) Did you hear that. Those assholes were seeing if we were ready, if the evacuation system was in order, folks prepared, no sirens, just seeing if TV and radio and word of mouth were enough. Radiation’s not any flying saucer, goddamn it! (picks a plate off of the table and throws and smashes it like a Frisbee into the windowpane).
HE (switches radio stations and one phrase – “you’ll walk the floor” – of Hank Williams’ song can be heard) Sure, I’ll turn it off. Yeah, I’m turning it off. Jesus, you sick too. Here. Here. Don’t worry. ( trembling, he embraces “the air” a moment and then with his arm around “someone” goes and stands next to the sofa) You know, I was out picking slugs off the lettuce just 10 minutes ago. See this here spoon. Your truck’s still idling up on the road, hear it puttering. (Colors of the rainbow, as if refracted thru a dangling crystal prism, swing back and forth and around the room)(He glances toward the window) Look at those buzzards already circling – they’re quick buggers. (He turns back to talk) God, you didn’t have to, you’re gorgeous. Look at that rainbow of light flickering on your breasts. (He bends to kiss and suck {her breasts} and drops the spoon on the floor)
No, I’m okay. Feels good. Yeah, you’re right, easy does it. Easy does it. Nice. Yeah, another slug of that hooch. Love your fingers kneading my ass. You, too? Tight, yeah, tighter. Pretty boy. Pretty boy, is that what you’re cooing… ahuh, that’s right, you got it, big little bird’s comin’ home to momma, you say? (His dead wife {looking just like the dummy} appears at the door, glances at the box of silverware on the sideboard, and reaches in and switches off the house light, and all the stage lights go off simultaneously – complete darkness for about 16 seconds. Fin.
THE PLANT
for three characters, He and She and Woman, Stage Script
HE (he is in garden working, sleepy looking, and muttering aloud) Goddamn slugs come in and creep their slime over the lettuce every night. Eat me and my mother if they could. One after another ad infinitum, I’ll never get you all. Fuckin’ beautiful morning, though, maple and oak so green. Look at that sun with the clouds flapping across its face, swimming in the big blue. Hey Mr Sun, nice fleecy scarves you got, and me here in my dirty rags. You look like Paradise, and I could be Mr Banal – both of us clichés. Birds everywhere (whistles trying to imitate and talk to a bird) – fencepost, in the lilacs, those over there in the grass fussing for bugs and worms. And some there in the woods singing, just singing away buried in the branches and leaves. And me, I’m a slug spooner, just spooning slugs buried in tedium like a machine working an assembly line. Bad back but I’d still rather be overturning the soil, crumbling it, planting. (all the time he’s talking he is off and on stooping and picking slugs and plopping them in a bucket) Wife’s in the kitchen, guess making coffee, listening to the radio. Probably, still wearing her nightdress, lamb-skin slippers, her hair down, her slender fingers playing with a spoon like she used to like to play with my cock now and then. We got it good. Love. Luv. Loo. Always Spring(says this a bit ironically and smirks) How does it go? – summer is the crudest season, bleeding lies out of the dung…and little Lulu’s bung.
Road above our place at the top of the hollow is dirt. Township assholes keep vowing to pave it to make a few bucks on the side, but we keep putting stumbling blocks in their way. All of the neighbors agree on that – we don’t want asphalt with all the hotdog cars and road kills it would bring. Dust’s preferable. Babies eat it when they’re deficient in some minerals – like this. ( He sticks a small stone in his mouth and spits it out and grins) I ain’t no baby, just pretending to be Cicero and understand my fuckin’ King’s English as best I can, even if I am full of shit. We don’t have any kids yet, but we can imagine them running all around the woods or fields without fear of city traffic or teenagers bent on the high of speed and death. My wife wants a baby, but that’s gonna have to wait until I have a better income. You know how it is when you don’t want to dig in, bite the bullet, and take on the responsibility of a nine to five job and getting up every morning to face pissy diapers rather than the sunrise. Not that I like getting up at all, just getting’ it up. Always afraid she’s gonna go off the pill, though, without telling me.
Slugs are a real bitch. That organic, tiny particle glass stuff works on them, but I don’t have any handy. Boy, I hate picking these things. Tonight I’m gonna put jar lids with beer all over the garden to trap them, and see if their numbers are finite. There’s something pleasantly satisfying to see them dead and drowned, almost melted into a pile, and waiting for you to put them all in a bucket and throw them into the compost. If it doesn’t work, I’ll just continue picking them off one by one. Spooning them up one by one makes me a little squeamish, and, I admit, more like a murderer than the steward of Providence of the night-before technique, a little tipsy with the gift of beer. I’m not even particularly fond of lettuce, but my bitch is. Pardon your slip of tongue, Sir. My wife. She’s probably slurping up her coffee, and getting ready to come out and join me in the workforce. (He yells an aside in a direction away from the house – “ Hi honey, Adam’s waiting in the garden with the worm. Got some Golden Delicious for you too .”)
The Plant
Script 2
(He looks up toward the road) A bit unusual this morning. These pickups coming down the road with huge piles of plastic sheets billowing in the back. Roped down. You can hear the ragged ends fluttering like a cage of wings on crack.
(Suddenly, his wife comes running down the steps from the porch to the garden, her hands aflutter and shouting, looking confused and scared) (She’s wearing green slacks and sports an exaggerated wedding ring the size of a cherry tomato)
SHE We got to clear out pronto, hon. (she has a coffee spoon in her hand)
HE What?! (he looks confused)
SHE Looks like some catastrophe at the nuclear plant – a meltdown they say. We’re too close for comfort. All over the radio stations. Let’s go! Come on.
HE Okay, go flag down a truck and ask what’s going on. I’ll get the keys to the car. (She runs up toward the road. Sound of trucks coming down the road, and the sound of screeching brakes) (He trips over the bucket of slugs on his way to the house and then returns just in time to hear a gut-wrenching scream from the road)
SHE (she was screaming and now rolls on the road like a ragdoll all covered with blood)
HE Hon Hon, oh my God! (he’s running up to the road, choking and spitting up) (No actual truck but a truck door built into a backdrop. It opens and a women gets out)
WOMAN God! God! No chance. Fuck. Like a roadkill. Fuck. (Together they pull the body off the road to the berm and prop it up in the weeds against the mailbox)
HE Set her up, sit her up, maybe she’ll come to. (He gags and vomits in the weeds)(sound of other trucks whizzing by) Jesus, another fuckin’ truck with Abraham’s plastic tent in the back! Hon! Hon! (while saying this he looks first at his dead wife and then at the woman)
Woman The plastic’s going to the high school basement, a bomb shelter, that’s what I hear. They got canned food there, Geiger counters, six-packs even. If you cover the ceiling and walls with plastic the radiation don’t get in.
HE Fuck, look at my hands, blood and slugs. Shit. (Goes over to wife) Look at her ring, pulsating like one of those little strobe toys for kids. (He bends and takes her pulse) Not even the rabbit-beat of a heart. Warm as anything. Hon Sweetie. ( the spoon he was scooping slugs with can be seen sticking out of his pocket) ( Unaware of what he’s doing, he lifts up the red flag of the mail box, pulls the spoon out of his pocket, puts it back, and then convulsively gags and vomits over his dead wife)
HE Just gonna leave you here honey. Forgive me. Don’t know what else to do. We gotta get inside somewhere, but not the schoolhouse. That plastic shit is bullshit anyway. God, the locals even believe that God comes to their church suppers. (Turns to the woman) Let’s go hole up in the house until…
WOMAN Aren’t you going to the school? Why in the hell…
HE I don’t believe in that bonk.
WOMAN Thank goodness, neither do I. I got some wine in the truck. I’ll get it.
HE You okay? You look like you’re burning, like the Spirit’s in you. (spot and stage lights on her until she almost glows)
I’m scared. More than it shows. Feels like the End. Let’s go down, down inside. Coffee. Fuck yes coffee… I can’t think. (she nods yes)(he turns and stares at his dead wife)
The Plant
Script 3
Blood, blood all over you like a bucket of runny lipstick…still clutching your silverware coffee spoon. Come on, let’s hightail it down there. (lights go out for about 15 seconds while stagehands bring in kitchen table, shades are drawn shut, sofa, silverware box on sidetable near door, pot of marigolds, radio, a not too large nor very conspicuous, framed painting (1612) by Artemisia Gentileschi of Judith, her maid, and Holofernes on wall of room, some apples on the table, other furniture, props)(lights come on and they’re huddling, listening to the radio) Coffee’s still warm like it was waiting for us. Give me a slug of that wine.(radio blurts – just a test, testing local systems, just a test, etc) Did you hear that. Those assholes were seeing if we were ready, if the evacuation system was in order, folks prepared, no sirens, just seeing if TV and radio and word of mouth were enough. Radiation’s not any flying saucer, goddamn it! (picks a plate off of the table and throws and smashes it like a Frisbee against the wall.
WOMAN Turn it off. Turn it off. Jesus, I’m sick. Here. Hold me.
(both trembling they embrace a moment and then go sit on the sofa)
HE You know, I was out picking slugs off the lettuce just 10 minutes ago. See this here spoon. Your car’s still idling up on the road, hear it puttering. (Colors of the rainbow, as if refracted thru a dangling crystal prism, swing back and forth and around the room)(He glances toward the window) Look at those buzzards already circling – they’re quick buggers. (Meanwhile, she’s taken off her blouse and bra)(He turns and sees her) God, you’re gorgeous. Look at that rainbow of light fluttering on your breasts. (He bends to kiss and suck her breasts and drops the spoon on the floor)
WOMAN Easy does it. Easy does it. Nice. (She puts her arms around his buttocks and presses him tight) Pretty boy. Pretty boy. Your big little bird’s coming home to momma. (His dead wife appears at the door, glances at the box of silverware on the sideboard, and reaches in and switches off the house light, and all the stage lights go off simultaneously – complete darkness for about 10 seconds. Fin
