Two Husbands'... Part 1, Chapter 10

Two Husbands in their Offices

Two Husbands in their office

SMALLY
Again, we are strong. We really think so!
What our pencils are doing
is really important.
Yes. We’ve buttoned up our coats and
really gotten to work!

BIGGY
Yeah, really figuring out dishes
and dashes
and other perfunctory things.

SMALLY
Perfunctionary things, you mean!

BIGGY
Performing things with our own unction
in meaning something!

SMALLY
Yes. We’re going to manipulate money figures
with numbers and come to see some good.
We wish.

BIGGY
Yes, we wish.
And hope.

(Pause)

Two Husbands and their non-discovery

By holding one of our numbers up
and anointing ourselves with it!
Bong on the head! - number seven.
Bong on the head - number eight.
Bong on the head - number six.
Bong on the head - number two.
Bash on the head - number green,
number blue and red.
And, blank on the face - numeral Rye,
whatever that’s to mean?

(He reaches for a bottle of Rye whiskey)

SMALLY
Then, we’re written off.

BIGGY
Right.

(Pause)

SMALLY
Okay. Thinking the numbers right
we hold them up aloft -
as we think that they’ll do good for us.
They’ll do anything and everything.

BIGGY
Certainly. Soon.

SMALLY
Yet all remains quiet
no matter how long we jump around with them -
no matter how long we hold them up aloft.

BIGGY
Up over our desks and paper,
suddenly, they are like mist or clouds.

SMALLY
Evaporated.
Turning into mini-molecules
already hidden from us.
And our stubby fingers
like stupid, leadless pencils can’t
grasp them or group them
to get a hold of any new sums
or fresh equations.

BIGGY
Yeah. They’re like silver flickerings
over the blackboard of many fish.

SMALLY
Hurrying herring.

BIGGY
Or, mackerel that can’t be seen
above the graph.

SMALLY
They disperse,
run quickly - instantly -
    into the lines.

There is an empty square there!
More than one, two!
Then, all of them!
        Gasp!
Yes, all of them are emptied out
because of our blundering.

BIGGY
Every net hole is
    stranded
    without a fish-faced number
    there.

Look where they’ve sunk
    to the bottom
    and cannot be seen;
hidden deep in the cold, watery shadows
    like drowned corpses
    under the sea weeds.

SMALLY
Where are our numbers?
Where have they gone?
What have they sunk into -
been immersed - or emerged into -
dispersed or detained into?

From air to water to gas -
    wherever they go
    they explode emptyingly out -
    (as if they are emptying)
    and are, once more,
    of no use to us.

BIGGY
Yes, we can’t get our hands on them.
Yes, they’ve lost their shape and form
and don’t stand up tall,
round and providing.

SMALLY
Not providing us anything!

NARRATOR
Two Husbands in their offices
and their non-discovery.
NOT important.
NO numbers adding up
or going ANYwhere! AT all!
SO there Two Husbands, I shout!
THOUGH, who am I? A new numbering recruit?

BIGGY
We must get out of the
world impure of numbers.
and find wheels or ways
to get outside of this office.
To get where we’re going, fast.

SMALLY
Do we need to think of numbers fair?

BIGGY
No, we don’t.
We’ll let go of them all now
and walk right out of the door.

SMALLY
What’s our new destination?

BIGGY
Wherever our wives are.

SMALLY
Oh, yeah, we’ll go get them!

(The Two Husbands do not leave the office)

Note to Readers: At this time, the Prince Giant has turned the Two Wives into two pennies, in Mexico.

(End of Chapter 10)

Portraits Gallery 022

portrait of a golfer, 2003

kid outside, 2005

hip hop guy, 2007

Two Husbands'... Part 1, Chapter 9

Losing Hold

look at the disappearing numbers!

NARRATOR

Two Husbands:

big heads, wide faces;

    grins or not

Ecstatic speculation,

then disappointment.

Clenched fingers in knotted palms.

Clenched hands, clenched fingers

    into frustrated fists

    with nowhere to go.

SMALLY sighs,

Back to the miserable graphs

and the squares of numbers.

Into the immoveable black net again,

where numbers’ pains persist.

BIGGY

Where numbers’ pains surround and belch!

SMALLY

Or they get added on to - 

to grow discomfortably fat,

un-proportionately unequal to each other,

    not the same -

    at odds!

BIGGY

Ruthless, toothless and raw -

    rather bad -

not responding, un-regarding,

foolhardy speculations!

SMALLY

With their bottoms falling out.

BIGGY

Square boxes losing respect

for their own equalities!

(Biggy and Smally stand back from the graph)

NARRATOR

Square boxes twisting and turning -

being bent and stretching -

sort of semi-collapsing upon each other...

(A high-pitched squeaking sound emits from the wall)

And then, a howl!

A hole made of wiry black jaws appears

    and sucks in

all the remaining numbers rapidly

    into itself,

with a squeeze or a pop.

And the Husbands’ numbers are gone!

    swiftly out of reach

    up off the wall

and then into the graph.

Right shock and awe

has reached their face.

Their clambering fingers 

have no where to reach

and clench into themselves,

fisting impotently, without charm,

in front of the broadening white space

where long chains of square black boxes

    dissolve and disappear -

their mental compartments

closing off into the one hole!

BIGGY perplexed,

Our black mental squares are not containing anything!

They are spread off by the white mist continuing

beside our work - regardless of it.

something strange is happening on the board!

SMALLY

Prepare a number:

it cannot or will not stay in its place.

BIGGY

There it moves

and by clouds it is caught

and trails off,

leaving no prints on this mist!

SMALLY

Yes, it goes into the clouds -

into these broadening white walls

with nothing.

BIGGY

No graphs, wires or holdings -

or containers.

No workings, sympathetically.

SMALLY

No conducive springs

or leaps or bounds into one another.

No glad tidings. No respect.

two men in a quandary

BIGGY

A failure? Is that what we see here?

SMALLY

The black compartments had a way

of containing themselves with dignity

    but not now.

Now, they’re all molding together

without boundaries and are losing hold

upon their own significance.

BIGGY

You mean, we’re losing our hold

upon their significance.

SMALLY

They are losing their holds

upon their separately chosen places.

And upon ours, too - as we can no longer fit

inside the graph together, either - mentally.

BIGGY, becoming surly,

Their holds

are not being claimed.

They’re clanging together

and creating one most disturbing,

disappearing mass.

It’s like all the black lines chose

to thread their stiff, wiry way

into a hole: a tiny spick of a dot

that resembles a dent in the wall -

a prick there stunk in!

And they are perceived, or not,

as possibly continuing.

But not!

SMALLY

I don’t know?

BIGGY

I suppose.

SMALLY

But continuing when? Where?

If they’re really already gone...?

four birds pull out the 2 Husbands' graph!

(The Two Husbands continue gabbling at each other; while, mysteriously, outside of their office window four strong birds are seen to be flying away with the graph chart!)

NARRATOR

Later, alone in his office, Biggy has a dreamy vision

of a wondrous creature.

ONLOOKER

Could his vision be of someone unknown

who replaces the numbers on the graph?

A Wondrous Creature

(End of Chapter 9)