Flowers for Hitler Read online

  COLLECTOR: May I make a suggestion?

  MARY: Of course.

  COLLECTOR: Two dollars.

  MARY: Two dollars. (Goes to her purse obediently.)

  COLLECTOR: I don’t think that’s too much, do you?

  MARY: No no.

  COLLECTOR: Five dollars would be too much.

  MARY: Too much.

  COLLECTOR: And one dollar just doesn’t seem right.

  MARY: Oh, I only have a five. I don’t have any change.

  COLLECTOR: I’ll take it.

  MARY: You’ll take it?

  COLLECTOR: I’ll take it. (A command.)

  (MARY drops the bill in the transaction, being afraid to make any physical contact with the COLLECTOR. MARY stoops to pick it up. The COLLECTOR prevents her.)

  COLLECTOR: Let me do that. The whole idea is not to treat us like invalids. You just watch how well I get along. (The COLLECTOR retrieves the money with immense difficulty.)

  COLLECTOR: That wasn’t so bad, was it?

  MARY: No. Oh no. It wasn’t so bad.

  COLLECTOR: I’ve even done a little dancing in my time.

  MARY: That’s nice.

  COLLECTOR: They have courses for us. First we do it in water, but very soon we’re right up there on dry land. I bet you do some dancing yourself, a girl like you. I heard music when I came.

  MARY: Not really.

  COLLECTOR: Do you know what would make me very happy?

  MARY: It’s very late.

  COLLECTOR: To see you do a step or two.

  MARY: I’m quite tired.

  COLLECTOR: A little whirl.

  MARY: I’m not very good.

  COLLECTOR: A whirl, a twirl, a bit of a swing. I’ll put it on for you.

  (The COLLECTOR begins to make her way to the record-player. MARY, who cannot bear to see her expend herself, overtakes her and switches it on. MARY performs for a few moments while the COLLECTOR looks on with pleasure, tapping out the time. MARY breaks off the dance.)

  MARY: I’m not very good.

  COLLECTOR: Would a little criticism hurt you?

  MARY: No –

  COLLECTOR: They’re not dancing like that any more.

  MARY: No?

  COLLECTOR: They’re doing something altogether different.

  MARY: I wouldn’t know.

  COLLECTOR: More like this.

  (The record has reached the end of its spiral and is now jerking back and forth over the last few bars.)

  COLLECTOR: Don’t worry about that.

  (The COLLECTOR moves to stage centre and executes a terrifying dance to the repeating bars of music. It combines the heavy mechanical efficiency of a printing machine with the convulsions of a spastic. It could be a garbage heap falling down an escalator. It is grotesque but military, excruciating but triumphant. It is a woman-creature proclaiming a disease of the flesh. MARY tries to look away but cannot. She stares, dumbfounded, shattered, and ashamed.)

  COLLECTOR: We learn to get around, don’t we?

  MARY: It’s very nice. (She switches off the machine.)

  COLLECTOR: That’s more what they’re doing.

  MARY: Is it?

  COLLECTOR: In most of the places. A few haven’t caught on.

  MARY: I’m very tired now. I think –

  COLLECTOR: You must be tired.

  MARY: I am.

  COLLECTOR: With all my talking.

  MARY: Not really.

  COLLECTOR: I’ve taken your time.

  MARY: You haven’t.

  COLLECTOR: I’ll write you a receipt.

  MARY: It isn’t necessary.

  COLLECTOR: Yes it is. (She writes.) This isn’t official. An official receipt will be mailed to you from Fund headquarters. You’ll need it for Income Tax.

  MARY: Thank you.

  COLLECTOR: Thank you. I’ve certainly enjoyed this.

  MARY: Me too. (She is now confirmed in a state of numbed surrender.)

  COLLECTOR (with a sudden disarming tenderness that changes through the speech into a vision of uncompromising domination): No, you didn’t. Oh, I know you didn’t. It frightened you. It made you sort of sick. It had to frighten you. It always does at the beginning. Everyone is frightened at the beginning. That’s part of it. Frightened and – fascinated. Fascinated – that’s the important thing. You were fascinated too, and that’s why I know you’ll learn the new step. You see, it’s a way to start over and forget about all the things you were never really good at. Nobody can resist that, can they? That’s why you’ll learn the new step. That’s why I must teach you. And soon you’ll want to learn. Everybody will want to learn. We’ll be teaching everybody.

  MARY: I’m fairly busy.

  COLLECTOR: Don’t worry about that. We’ll find time. We’ll make time. You won’t believe this now, but soon, and it will be very soon, you’re going to want me to teach you everything. Well, you better get some sleep. Sleep is very important. I want to say thank you. All the Obese want to say thank you.

  MARY: Nothing. Goodnight.

  COLLECTOR : Just beginning for us.

  (Exit the COLLECTOR. MARY, dazed and exhausted stands at the door for some time. She moves toward stage centre, attempts a few elementary exercises, collapses into the chair and stares dumbly at the audience. The sound of a key in the lock. Door opens. Enter DIANE alone, crying.)

  DIANE: I didn’t want him to see me home.

  (MARY is unable to cope with anyone else’s problem at this point.)

  MARY: What’s the matter with you?

  DIANE: It’s impossible.

  MARY: What’s impossible?

  DIANE: What happened.

  MARY: What happened?

  DIANE: He doesn’t want to see me any more.

  MARY: Harry?

  DIANE: Harry.

  MARY: Your Harry?

  DIANE: You know damn well which Harry.

  MARY: Doesn’t want to see you any more?

  DIANE: No.

  MARY: I thought he loved you.

  DIANE: So did I.

  MARY: I thought he really loved you.

  DIANE: So did I.

  MARY: You told me he said he loved you.

  DIANE: He did.

  MARY: But now he doesn’t?

  DIANE: No.

  MARY: Oh.

  DIANE: It’s terrible.

  MARY: It must be.

  DIANE: It came so suddenly.

  MARY: It must have.

  DIANE: I thought he loved me.

  MARY: So did I.

  DIANE: He doesn’t!

  MARY: Don’t cry.

  DIANE: He’s getting married.

  MARY: He isn’t!

  DIANE: Yes.

  MARY: He isn’t!

  DIANE: This Sunday.

  MARY: This Sunday?

  DIANE: Yes.

  MARY: So soon?

  DIANE: Yes.

  MARY: He told you that?

  DIANE: Tonight.

  MARY: What did he say?

  DIANE: He said he’s getting married this Sunday.

  MARY: He’s a bastard.

  DIANE: Don’t say that.

  MARY: I say he’s a bastard.

  DIANE: Don’t talk that way.

  MARY: Why not?

  DIANE: Don’t.

  MARY: After what he’s done?

  DIANE: It’s not his fault.

  MARY: Not his fault?

  DIANE: He fell in love.

  (The word has its magic effect.)

  MARY: Fell in love?

  DIANE: Yes.

  MARY: With someone else?

  DIANE: Yes.

  MARY: He fell out of love with you?

  DIANE: I suppose so.

  MARY: That’s terrible.

  DIANE: He said he couldn’t help it.

  MARY: Not if it’s love.

  DIANE: He said it was.

  MARY: Then he couldn’t help it.

  (DIANE begins to remove her make-up and undress, reversing exactly every step of her toil
et. MARY, still bewildered, but out of habit, assists her.)

  MARY: And you’re so beautiful.

  DIANE: No.

  MARY: Your hair.

  DIANE: No.

  MARY: Your shoulders.

  DIANE: No.

  MARY: Everything.

  (Pause.)

  MARY: What did he say?

  DIANE: He told me everything.

  MARY: Such as what?

  DIANE: Harry’s a gentleman.

  MARY: I always thought so.

  DIANE: He wanted me to know everything.

  MARY: It’s only fair.

  DIANE: He told me about her.

  MARY: What did he say?

  DIANE: He said he loves her.

  MARY: Then he had no choice.

  DIANE: He said she’s beautiful.

  MARY: He didn’t!

  DIANE: What can you expect?

  MARY: I suppose so.

  DIANE: He loves her, after all.

  MARY: Then I guess he thinks she’s beautiful.

  (Pause.)

  MARY: What else did he say?

  DIANE: He told me everything.

  MARY: How did he meet her?

  DIANE: She came to his house.

  MARY: What for?

  DIANE: She was collecting money.

  MARY: Money! (Alarm.)

  DIANE: For a charity.

  MARY: Charity!

  DIANE: Invalids of some kind.

  MARY: Invalids!

  DIANE: That’s the worst part.

  MARY: What part?

  DIANE: She’s that way herself.

  MARY: What way?

  DIANE: You know.

  MARY: What way, what way?

  DIANE: You know.

  MARY: Say it!

  DIANE: She’s an invalid.

  MARY: Harry’s marrying an invalid?

  DIANE: This Sunday.

  MARY: You said he said she was beautiful.

  DIANE: He did.

  MARY: Harry is going to marry an invalid.

  DIANE: What should I do?

  MARY: Harry who said he loved you. (Not a question.)

  DIANE: I’m miserable.

  (MARY is like a woman moving through a fog toward a light.)

  MARY: Harry is going to marry an invalid. He thinks she’s beautiful.

  (MARY switches on the record-player.) She came to his door. Harry who told you he loved you. You who told me I had my points.

  (“The Dance of the Sugar-Plum Fairies” begins. MARY dances but she does not use the steps she learned at the YWCA. She dances in conscious imitation of the COLLECTOR.)

  DIANE: What are you doing? (Horrified.)

  (MARY smiles at her.)

  DIANE: Stop it! Stop it this instant!

  MARY: Don’t tell me what to do. Don’t you dare. Don’t ever tell me what to do. Don’t ever.

  (The dance continues, DIANE, dressed in bra and panties as at the beginning, backs away.)

  CURTAIN

  THE PAPER

  My fingers trembled

  like eyelashes assailed by lust

  I signed a paper preventing

  the Market from loving me

  My childhood friends lined up

  to say goodbye

  I mistook their gesture

  for a firedrill

  and out of habit of hatred

  for the make-believe

  I underlined my signature

  Goodbye girls and boys

  I call today in a riper voice

  In the cold mirror of opium

  I saw all our lives

  connected and precise

  as pieces in a clock

  and the shining ladder

  I teetered on was nothing

  but the pendulum

  NURSERY RHYME

  A beautiful woman dignified

  the cocktail lounge

  suddenly we were drinking

  for a reason

  We were all Absolutists

  with a rose carved in our minds

  by a 5-year-old brain surgeon

  Gentlemen

  somewhere a shabby wife waits for us

  with some decent news about chickenpox

  But let me speak for myself

  I believe in God

  I have seen angels pulsing

  through the veined atmosphere

  I am alone with a window

  full of bones and wrinkles

  O terrible eyes

  O perfect mouth

  my fantasy shipwrecked

  on the metal of your hair

  Your beauty rides a wet flower

  like a sail above a deep old hull

  I need to touch you

  with my fleshy calipers

  Desire is the last church

  and the ashtrays

  are singing with hunger

  Even if you are the Golden Calf

  you are better than money

  or government

  and I have bent my knee

  Roses are roses

  blue is blue

  History Greece Art Measure Face Tree Sphere Blossom Terror Rose

  remind me remind me remind me

  OLD DIALOGUE

  - Has this new life deepened your perceptions?

  - I suppose so.

  - Then you are being trained correctly.

  - For what?

  - If you knew we could not train you.

  WINTER BULLETIN

  Toronto has been good to me

  I relaxed on TV

  I attacked several dead horses

  I spread rumours about myself

  I reported a Talmudic quarrel

  with the Montreal Jewish Community

  I forged a death certificate

  in case I had to disappear

  I listened to a huckster

  welcome me to the world

  I slept behind my new sunglasses

  I abandoned the care of my pimples

  I dreamed that I needed nobody

  I faced my trap

  I withheld my opinion on matters

  on which I had no opinion

  I humoured the rare January weather

  with a jaunty step for the sake of heroism

  Not very carefully

  I thought about the future

  and how little I know about animals

  The future seemed unnecessarily black and strong

  as if it had received my casual mistakes

  through a carbon sheet

  WHY DID YOU GIVE MY NAME TO THE POLICE?

  You recited the Code of Comparisons

  in your mother’s voice.

  Again you were the blue-robed seminary girl

  but these were not poplar trees and nuns

  you walked between.

  These were Laws.

  Damn you for making this moment hopeless,

  now, as a clerk in uniform fills

  in my father’s name.

  You too must find the moment hopeless

  in the Tennyson Hotel.

  I know your stomach.

  The brass bed bearing your suitcase

  rumbles away like an automatic

  promenading target in a shooting gallery:

  you stand with your hands full

  of a necklace you wanted to pack.

  In detail you recall your rich dinner.

  Grab that towel rack!

  Doesn’t the sink seem a fraud

  with its hair-swirled pipes?

  Doesn’t the overhead bulb

  seem burdened with mucous?

  Things will be better at City Hall.

  Now you must learn to read

  newspapers without laughing.

  No hysterical headline breakfasts.

  Police be your Guard,

  Telephone Book your Brotherhood.

  Action! Action! Action!

  Goodbye Citizen.

  The clerk is talking to nobody.

  Do you see how I have tip
toed

  out of his brown file?

  He fingers his uniform

  like a cheated bargain hunter.

  Answer me, please talk to me, he weeps,

  say I’m not a doorman.

  I plug the wires of your fear

  (ah, this I was always meant to do)

  into the lust-asylum universe:

  raped by aimless old electricity

  you stiffen over the steel books of your bed

  like a fish

  in a liquid air experiment.

  Thus withers the Civil Triumph

  (Laws rush in to corset the collapse)

  for you are mistress to the Mayor,

  he electrocuted in your frozen juices.

  GOVERNMENTS MAKE ME LONELY

  Speech from the Throne

  dissolves my friends

  like a miracle soap

  and there’s only the Queen and me

  and her English

  Soon she’s gone too

  I find myself wandering

  with her English

  across a busy airfield

  I am insignificant as an aspirant

  in the Danger Reports

  Why did I listen to the radio

  A man with a yellow bolo-bat

  lures my immortal destiny

  into a feeding trough

  for Royal propellers

  and her English follows

  like an airline shoulder bag

  I’m alone

  Goodbye little Jewish soul

  I knew things

  would not go soft for you

  but I meant you

  for a better wilderness

  THE LISTS

  Straffed by the Milky Way

  vaccinated by a snarl of clouds

  lobotomized by the bore of the moon

  he fell in a heap

  some woman’s smell

  smeared across his face

  a plan for Social Welfare

  rusting in a trouser cuff

  From five to seven

  tall trees doctored him

  mist roamed on guard

  Then it began again

  the sun stuck a gun in his mouth

  the wind started to skin him

  Give up the Plan give up the Plan

  echoing among its scissors

  The women who elected him

  performed erotic calesthenics

  above the stock-reports

  of every hero’s fame

  Out of the corner of his stuffed eye

  etched in minor metal

  under his letter of the alphabet

  he clearly saw his tiny name

  Then a museum slid under

  his remains like a shovel

  TO THE INDIAN PILGRIMS