Death is a Salesman

      This is my one act play. I played off the famous "Death of a Salesman" title and spun it into my own play. I wasn't sure where it was going to go when I started, and by the time I got to the end, I found myself appalled at how pessimistic it seemed. However, all in all, I found it a pretty fun piece to write. Enjoy!

Scene I

Scene is revealed. It is misty and out of focus, but the spotlight slowly zeros in on Death, dressed like the Grim Reaper, mumbling into a telephone with both feet kicked up on a desk. He is smoking a Cuban cigar; his scythe is leaning against a hat rack.
DEATH: What do you mean not ready yet?! (DEATH listens intently)

(Squeaky voices are heard on the other line)

DEATH: Listen, this is not how things must be? I’m sure we could work something out . . . (he trails off)

(Squeaky voices are heard on the other line)

DEATH: (sharply) Meet me tomorrow in the square. Don’t be late.

Scene. All fades to black

Scene II

Scene opens. There is an old clock tower looming behind center stage. An audio track of bustling people is heard. Many people are rushing on and off stage except two. The first is a man, near fifty years of age and balding; age has not treated him well, and the audience can see him wheezing uncontrollably. The second is DEATH who is lurking in the shadow of the clock tower. He makes a summoning gesture with his bony hands toward the man. The man limps toward DEATH.

DEATH: You’re late, Bill. (He nods toward the clock)

BILL: *coughs* Deepest apologies. The trains were backed up for a while because of some suicide and—

(DEATH cuts him off)

DEATH: I cannot be troubled with your mundane problems. Blame the suicidal girl; Sally, I think it was.

(DEATH opens his robes, reaches inside its shadowy depths and produces a ball of light, Sally)

(BILL, horrified, shies away from the glowing orb)

BILL: No! Stop put that away! I do not doubt your abilities. You need not show off. All I want is more time.

DEATH: Very well then. (He places Sally back into his robes) So how much time is it that you want?

BILL: A year, that is all I ask of you. It is just enough time to say my goodbyes and watch my dear Samantha graduate from high school. Please, I’m begging you.

DEATH: You want a year? It’ll cost you roughly thirty years indentured to me.

BILL: *gasp* I cannot! I’m sorry my dear Samantha! Forgive me, but I simply cannot follow through with such a heinous—

(DEATH cuts him off)

DEATH: Oh! Did I say thirty years? Oh no, no, no. Silly me, I meant twenty years. Yes, and if you act now I’ll throw in an innovative formula for hair regeneration—effective in Life and in Death!

BILL: Samantha, forgive me! I’m sorry, but twenty years is too—

(DEATH cuts him off)

DEATH: BILL, Billy, may I call you Billy? I have certain, say, quotas to meet. Do you hear me? You are going to have an eternity on the Other Side is ten years really such a hassle? And, just for you, I’ll even throw in an extra month to see your darling Samantha off to college.

BILL: Hmmm... You make everything sound so reasonable. I think we have a deal.

DEATH: Excellent! (He reaches his hand out)

BILL: (shakes DEATH’s bony hand and drops dead)

Scene. All fades to black.

Scene III

Scene opens. DEATH is sitting at his desk once again, feet set nonchalantly upon it. His scythe is again leaned against a hat rack and he is smoking another Cuban. There is a glowing orb floating above his desk.

DEATH: (aside) Billy, oh foolish Billy. You cannot cheat DEATH. I am no fool. (He grasps the orb) Sleep tight, Billy. (He hisses before he shoves orb in his robe)

Scene. All fades to black.

Why I'm Not Concerned with My Appearance

    This is my conversation poem. We were supposed to give a little insight of who we were by describing something we were not. Some people described why they weren't swimmers or chefs, but I decided to describe why I wasn't concerned with my appearance. Enjoy!

It’s only temporary-my appearance that is
It will fade and wrinkle
Like tissue paper with time


As long as I am comfortable in my skin
Why should I spend hours primping and preening?
It’s a comfortable and carefree life
Where I don’t have to suffer
The horrors of itchy, tight, yet stylish attire


No recuperation from vicious stabs
Of the bristled mascara wand
Or the irritating scratches of the eyeliner pencil
And for what?
To be ruthlessly judged and compared to others
“Is that really what you’re wearing?”


Free yourself from the evils of scorn
Have faith in who you are
And wear what you want!
When you want!
And most importantly...
Be your own dictionary
 —and define yourself.

10 Ways of Looking at Red

This is my 10 Ways of Looking at poem, popularized by Wallace Stevens in his poem, "13 Ways of Looking at a Blackbird." We actually did a collaborative activity of this where we passed our poems around the room and one person would write a stanza in the style of Stevens. I found the activity quite interesting because it was cool to see how other people interpreted one thing. Enjoy!


Desolate, naked woods

A landscape of a snowy white

And a splash of Red

Spilled in the circle of life


I am of many moods

And one of them is a rage

As hot as a Red star


The Red of the hot autumn sky

Lay over the quiet field like a blanket

Just before the dark


Count the shades of Red

Red is everywhere

Count them- Red of a rose

or Red of war-torn failures

Count the shades of Red


Red

So dark it’s almost

Black

Drips and splatters

Like blots of

Red, Red ink,

Ink that writes your fate


Look at the Red of the water

When God punished the Pharaoh—

Or the Red that filled Moses’ painted sea


Explosions

Then Red flickering fire

In the silence


When the Red horizon,

Collapsed out of sight

It marked

The horizontal end,

Of an endless world


Aphrodite’s robes hung Red,

The color of love

Lust in her eyes

Her passion is never dead


 The day fades to black

Only a speck of Red

Where the sun

had once called

—home.

Indecision

     This is my prose poem. As you can see, it is in the form a singular paragraph. In it I personify the emotion of indecision. I later modified it and made it into a visual poem which you can see at your viewing pleasure here. Enjoy!

     Indecision teeters and totters upon an intimidating cliff. Straddling the thin line between yes and no, Indecision wears grey, never black or white. His mind runs rampant, processing numbers and outcomes yet always failing to choose. He coasts through life, wasting precious time, always wondering “What if?” instead of “Why not?” When asked a simple question, he shuffles his grey shoes, eyes downcast, mumbling a wishy-washy, “I dunno.” He is the caution sign in your life, the anchor weighing you down from taking that fateful leap. Back and forth, he sways like a limber palm bending in the breezes of influence. Make the decision, and never allow him the liberty to consume you.

Preface

     This is my preface for my Personal Anthology I had to compile for my Honors English course. It was quite time consuming and I did not sleep the night before it was due, so I was a wee bit delirious while writing this. Unfortunately I cannot include my entire anthology, but it was basically 25 pieces of literature which I written weekly essays on, bound creatively in a scrapbook like thing. Enjoy!

      Inspiration can strike anywhere. For me, it was under the all-knowing eye of my showerhead. It seemed like any other shower; even the spider was nothing out of the ordinary. However, inspiration struck as I was subconsciously splashing water onto the spider. I did not think anything of it until a few seconds later, it resurfaced. Annoyed, I had splashed at it again, assuring its impending watery death, but somehow it once again pulled itself up and continued. This spider had an inextinguishable fire, blazing inside of it, driving him to persevere. As I conditioned my hair, I pondered, “Who am I to drown this harmless little spider that yearns to live so passionately?” Being a slight arachnophobia, this thought was quite profound, for usually, I am under the impression that spiders are plotting my long, drawn out, violent death.

     Suddenly, it hit me like a stinging slap to the face. Revelation streamed like sunlight through the clouds of my lethargy—the itsy-bitsy spider. So simple yet so perfect, the infantile nursery rhyme seemed destined to emerge as the backbone to my anthology. There would be four chapters defining my anthology: the itsy-bitsy spider climbed up the water spout, down came the rain and washed the spider out, out came the sun and dried out all the rain, and the itsy-bitsy spider climbed up the spout again. Each chapter would be supported with works, outlining the treacherous journey of my eight-legged protagonist and I could cleverly title it, “Reaching for the Water Spout” and perhaps promote it as a “self-motivation guide to a more secure self” or something of the likes.

     My first chapter circulates around youth, innocence, and naïveté; the initial passion exhibited in the spider’s first trial is admirable. The spider’s innocent and unhindered path in life parallels that of the pure, boundless creativity inferno radiating from the Little Prince’s soul. The Little Prince holds so many life lessons; it seemed the absolute candidate for my twenty-fifth work. This chapter nurtures the virgin mind of humanity, free of prior wisdom as portrayed through “Before you knew you owned it”; the rash and adamant mindset of self-righteous individuals as illustrated in Jack London’s “To Build a Fire”; the liberated souls, emancipated from the anchor that binds one from leaping into risky situations as preached in “Letter: Teach students to think, not obey.” Due to its emphasis on youth and vitality, I designated green as its color, for “Nature’s first green is gold.”

      My second chapter revolves around a theme of adversity and hardship— “Down came the rain and washed the spider out.” Whether the conflict is as shallow as a kiddie pool or as profoundly deep as a great abyss, there is not a soul in existence that has not crossed paths with the rude personality of calamity. I selected a spectrum of conflicts for this chapter, ranging from the fitful nightmares described in “Butterfly’s Dream” to the lack of recognition that accompanies the essential background roles like “Sidekicks” to the horror of defiling ones name as John Proctor of Miller’s The Crucible faced. Each work adds to the tapestry that is my anthology; each bringing its own unique backstory, laden with repressed tales of sorrow and melancholy hence this chapter’s color scheme is, fittingly, blue. With each thread bringing its own morose history, I propose that one take a stroll in one’s enemy’s shoes and attempt to walk a golden road to tolerance.

     My third chapter centers around a theme of light, knowledge, love, security and enlightenment—“Out came the sun and dried up all the rain.” In this chapter, I looked to the sun for inspiration and found heat, an unimaginable heat throbbing from the star’s core. It was true love, familiarity and unity, reflecting a vibrant orange. To encompass this vibrancy, I looked to the fierce heroine of Gone with the Wind, Scarlett O’Hara. Her adamant drive could have easily fallen under the youthful green of chapter one, but her passion and love for Rhett Butler thrusts her into the vivacious orange chapter in a spectacle of blinding tangerine.

     My fourth and final chapter focuses on facing and overcoming adversity— “And the itsy-bitsy spider climbed up the spout again.” The beauty of the itsy-bitsy spider is that it persevered and endured the hardships thrown its way with its head held high. Triumphing in the fierce battle of dilemmas is dangerous both emotionally and physically; therefore, there is bound to be blood spilled: metaphorically, literally or both. In fighting for what one deems moral, the scarlet blood of both parties is spilled into these pages of poetry—and into its color scheme, triumphing over prejudice like in Hughes’s “As I Grew Older,” sibling rivalry in Soto’s “Broken Chains,” and technology in Alben’s “I lost my smartphone and lived to tell about it.”

     The itsy-bitsy spider’s long and treacherous journey up the waterspout is that of youthful innocence, disheartening obstacles, vivid revelation, and a test of will to subdue the intruders of one’s contentedness. Although the anthology was a pain in the derriere at times, I optimistically hope that one day I will look back on my work and smile. Despite the late Sunday nights before an entry was due, I always had a sense of accomplishment and pride in what I had written even though I had written it half delirious. Surprisingly, I found that I tend to become inspired in the wee of the morn, for my mind is free to wander—so free in fact that sometimes it wanders to sleep. All in all, this anthology has punched a bold exclamation point on my need to stop procrastinating; however, on another note, it was a rewarding project, and I am proud to have completed this anthology, for without Honors English, I can honestly say I would not have willingly compiled such a massive collection. This anthology was the push for me to expand my horizons and explore different realms of my creativity.

Appointment with Love

      For this assignment, I worked with one of my colleagues on writing an ending to a story we had been told. Even though our ending was way off from the original ending,we had a great time writing it and our ending was quite unique in comparison to the others'. The first part of the story we were given were as follows:

"Six minutes to six, said the great round clock over the information booth in Grand Central Station. The tall young Army lieutenant who had just come from the direction of the tracks lifted his sunburned face, and his eyes narrowed to note the exact time. His heart was pounding with a beat that shocked him because he could not control it. In six minutes, he would see the woman who had filled such a special place in his life for the past 13 months, the woman he had never seen, yet whose written words had been with him and sustained him unfailingly.
He placed himself as close as he could to the information booth, just beyond the ring of people besieging the clerks...
Lieutenant Blandford remembered one night in particular, the worst of the fighting, when his plane had been caught in the midst of a pack of Zeros. He had seen the grinning face of one of the enemy pilots.
In one of his letters, he had confessed to her that he often felt fear, and only a few days before this battle, he had received her answer: "Of course you fear ... all brave men do. Didn't King David know fear? That's why he wrote the 23rd Psalm. Next time you doubt yourself, I want you to hear my voice reciting to you: 'Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil, for Thou art with me.'" And he had remembered; he had heard her imagined voice, and it had renewed his strength and skill.
Now he was going to hear her real voice. Four minutes to six. His face grew sharp.
Under the immense, starred roof, people were walking fast, like threads of color being woven into a gray web. A girl passed close to him, and Lieutenant Blandford started. She was wearing a red flower in her suit lapel, but it was a crimson sweet pea, not the little red rose they had agreed upon. Besides, this girl was too young, about 18, whereas Hollis Meynell had frankly told him she was 30. "Well, what of it?" he had answered. "I'm 32." He was 29.
His mind went back to that book - the book the Lord Himself must have put into his hands out of the hundreds of Army library books sent to the Florida training camp. Of Human Bondage, it was; and throughout the book were notes in a woman's writing. He had always hated that writing-in-habit, but these remarks were different. He had never believed that a woman could see into a man's heart so tenderly, so understandingly. Her name was on the bookplate: Hollis Meynell. He had got hold of a New York City telephone book and found her address. He had written, she had answered. Next day he had been shipped out, but they had gone on writing.
For 13 months, she had faithfully replied, and more than replied. When his letters did not arrive she wrote anyway, and now he believed he loved her, and she loved him.
But she had refused all his pleas to send him her photograph. That seemed rather bad, of course. But she had explained: "If your feeling for me has any reality, any honest basis, what I look like won't matter. Suppose I'm beautiful. I'd always be haunted by the feeling that you had been taking a chance on just that, and that kind of love would disgust me. Suppose I'm plain (and you must admit that this is more likely). Then I'd always fear that you were going on writing to me only because you were lonely and had no one else. No, don't ask for my picture. When you come to New York, you shall see me and then you shall make your decision. Remember, both of us are free to stop or to go on after that - whichever we choose..."
One minute to six - he pulled hard on a cigarette.
Then Lieutenant Blandford's heart leaped higher than his plane had ever done.
A young woman was coming toward him. Her figure was long and slim; her blond hair lay back in curls from her delicate ears. Her eyes were blue as flowers, her lips and chin had a gentle firmness. In her pale green suit, she was like springtime come alive.
He started toward her, entirely forgetting to notice that she was wearing no rose, and as he moved, a small, provocative smile curved her lips.
"Going my way, soldier?" she murmured.
Uncontrollably, he made one step closer to her. Then he saw Hollis Meynell.
She was standing almost directly behind the girl, a woman well past 40, her graying hair tucked under a worn hat. She was more than plump; her thick-ankled feet were thrust into low- heeled shoes. But she wore a red rose in the rumpled lapel of her brown coat.
The girl in the green suit was walking quickly away."

So without further ado, here is our ending. Enjoy!

      There was something familiar about her, as if they were somehow connected. Bradford couldn’t place it, but somehow he knew her.

      Helen limped over to him and tenderly reached out to caress his face. “My darling,” she whispered.

      “How do I know you, my sweet,” he bumbled mesmerized.

      “You must forgive me. I was young and so afraid,” she admitted, “I just couldn’t keep—” Helen burst into tears, throwing herself onto his shoulder.

      Bradford gently patted her as her whimpers subsided, “What do you mean, Helen?”

      Once she had caught her breath, Helen put herself together and explained, “I was sixteen when I became pregnant with you. It was unplanned and I just couldn’t afford to care for you, so I had to give you up, to give you a better life. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done, but when your adopted parents told me you were off in the war, I couldn’t help myself. I simply had to contact you. Please forgive me!”

      “Of course, I forgive you! You are my blood!” he assured her.

      Relieved, Helen wrapped him in a tight embrace and whispered, “I love you, my son.”

Six Word Memoirs

      The idea of the six word memoir was popularized by Mr. Ernest Hemingway—"For sale: baby shoes, never worn." We were assigned to compose our own. These are my six word memoirs. They were quite fun to Photoshop. Enjoy!