You're Doing It Again

He: You're doing it again. Stopping.

She: Forget all that.

He: It's something we have.

She: Just in your head.

He: The best thing we have.

She: It's nothing.

He: It's all we have.

She: Only words.

He: Only words!

She:    Forget them.

He: Then we'll have nothing.

She: It will be a rest.

He: We'll be nowhere.

She: That's the place.

He: You want us to be nowhere doing nothing?

She: We could give it a try.

He:     What?

She: Not trying.

He: Never. Impossible.

She: We could drop the whole business.

He:     Business? Did you say business?

She: We could at least take a break, time off. Everyone has a vacation.

He: Everyone, you say? Did you really say, vacation?

She: I didn't say a word. I missed my turn.

He: Being nowhere and doing nothing, you know what that's called?

She: A rest. I only want a rest.

He: Dying that's called. You want to be dead?

She: I tell you one thing.

He: She wants to be dead.

She: I can't take any more of this.

He: You mean life. You want to rest from life.

She: I give up, I tell you. I'm finished.

He: All right. We won't argue.

She: I'm not listening. I'm out of commission, taking a breather.

He: We'll keep it simple.

She: Dead. I'm dead.

He: The object is to stay where you are, to hold on, not to lose stature.

She: Whose object? I said I'm not listening.

He: At first just try to keep from sinking. Get a grip.

She: Always holding, lifting, trying. That's living?

He: If you come all the way down, we'll have to begin again, from scratch.

She: We, he says. But it's his show.

He: I'm helping you. We're doing this together.

She: Look for me in Scratchville.

He: It will be all the harder when you re-begin from all the way down.

She: Then I won't begin again. No more scratching.

He: Don't say what you don't mean.

She: I'm saying it and I mean it.

He: Make an effort. You mustn't stop.

She:   I've stopped. Leave me alone.

He: How can I leave you alone?

She: Think of another woman for a change.

He: Change won't help.

She: Then think of another woman full stop.

He: You know there can't be another woman.

She: I wish there were another woman.

He: Just stick where you are for a start.

She: You motherfucker.

He: The less ground you lose, the easier the climb will be for you afterwards.

She: He said that before. He's concerned for me, the prodding bastard.

He: It's worth digging in.

She: If there were another woman, we could share the effort.

He: There can be only one woman.

She: Never mind your scenario. I need help. A team is what I want.

He: You're the only woman.

She: Why?  He's crazy. It's crazy. Why only me?

He: Because there can be only one woman. She's you. You are all of them.

She: That's his story. It's too much for me. You're too much for me.

He: You were perfect, for a while.

She: Perfect my fanny. I was on the cross.

He: Then you started doing it again, slipping, stopping.

She: Isn't that what you want, me nailed up there?

He: You're right to dramatize. But the cross is from another story.

She: Then I don't have to drip blood on the faithful?

He: Let's go back to where you were doing perfectly.

She: Wait a moment. I want to get this straight.

He: You mustn't keep sliding.

She: No, wait. I want to quote you. Listen everyone, listen to this. The motherfucker says I don't have to be crucified.

He: When you were doing so well, why did you stop?

She: Because I was shagged, pooped, fizzled, squashed--understand, you son of a bitch?

He: That wasn't the reason.

She: Listen to him. He doesn't think that was the reason. You see, he understands women--he says woman, the prick.

He: Wait a moment. Why not dig in and wait?

She: You try to climb up with your shovel. You try digging the air.

He: Concentrate.

She: You Tarzan up here in the tree. Me Jane down there. Ass in a hole.

He: You know it can't be done like that.

She: I know, yes I know, because you tell me. The strange thing is I don't understand why not. Why you're not where I am and lifting yourself up by your balls. Why I'm not above you, all dignified cheering you onward and upward.

He: Because you're the Woman.

She: Oh, of course. How did I miss that capital W? Now it's all clear. The Woman.

He: It's the best of reasons.

She: Huh-huh.

He: Because you couldn't do my job.

She: You mean the muscular urging?

He: Exactly, the goal setting.

She: Without you there would be no climbing for me?

He: The world would be different.

She: There would be no sweat between my boobs?

He: No up no down. No fat no thin.

She: No sunshine?

He: Grey, flat, horizontal.

She: Excuse me, at this juncture, with respect, wouldn't that depend on one's point of view?

He: I said we'd keep this simple, no points of view.

She: But why couldn't you do what I'm supposed to do?

He: That would be only half the job. Remember, you couldn't do my part.

She: Says who? Why not? Get up there, partner. Pull yourself together.

He: I know tiredness wasn't the reason.

She: For what?

He: Why you started doing it again, slipping down, stopping.

She: You know, I don't think you're concentrating. You'll never get any altitude that way.

He: Tiredness isn't the difference between how you were before and how you are now.

She: Don't flutter. Whatever you do, no fluttering.

He: Now you're disappearing.

She:  Wings you don't have. So you can't flutter. Think tension. Concentrate.

He:    Then you rose to our imagination.

She: I didn't hear that. Let's say I didn't hear that. And I really think you ought to concentrate.

He: You rose to a man's imagination.

She: I'm not listening, and you had better concentrate. What did you tell me? I was to stand straight and push up through the top of my head as if I was growing.

He:  You rose to what's best in us.

She:    I was to be a bean stock woman.

He: You weren't tired.

She: Have you forgotten? We've put all that aside and we're concentrating. You've made a cute little nod and bob with the lid of your skull but you mustn't rest on your laurels.

He: You couldn't have been tired of being up there.

She: You had better think of your cells. Remember those cells? How did that go? Squeeze and squash to make every one of those little buggers swell and rise.

He: Then a man could dwell in you.

She: I won't listen. He can't talk like that. He imagines, he dwells. I pop my cells. I just don't think he understands. I mean, Christ, the law of gravity!

He: It's time to stop this nonsense.

She: What sense?  But you told me about those teeny-weenies. Billions of the varmits, but I wasn't to let that discourage me. Push a little here and pull a little there, and I'd be on my way. Ups-a-daisy, cells on a picnic in the wind.

He: Answer one question. Didn't the fact that you signified something for us give you pleasure?

She: No pleasure. None at all. Not an itch.

He: It shook you. That sort of pleasure is hard to admit. You'd rather look the other way.

She: Jesus, I'm blushing again and turning my head.

He: You weren't tired. Your effort had turned into meaning. It was all that meaning you

couldn't stand.

She: Give me a crutch, no, two, a couple pair.

He: Meaning so much, being the Woman, was too much for you.

She: You big-big man make much words about itsy-bitsy she-thing.

He: Don't be ashamed. It's understandable. We'll try again.

She: Me got nose ready for ring.

He: Don't wallow in insignificance.

She: Me no got prick, hardly even hole, only slit slash.

He: Don't slip any further.

She: Wallow hollow me.

He: Come back to yourself.

She: My fucking self?

He: You want meaning too.

She: What I want is out of this.

He: Be the Woman.

She: He knows, he does.

He: Remember how you felt up there in the pure air.

She:   My hands ached.

He: I worshipped you from down below, years in my eyes.

She: And now you look down on me? And why years?

He: Then you were huge.

She: Wait, stop. Don't you mean tears?

He: Now you're trivial like your talk.

She: You trample me with your years, your then, your now.

He: You can't honestly say you don't feel the difference.

She:  I'm loaded with feeling. It hurts. The same as before.

He: Then and now. It's different.

She: Who knows? You harp on it so.

He: You were awake. Now you're asleep.

She:  Nothing like that. No.

He: You were a tower. You filled the horizon.

She: Maybe I don't feel exactly the same.

He: You made the world larger.

She: I'm medium height for a woman.

He: Giantess, priestess.

She: You don't even go to church.

He: A holy whore.

She: Words, you say those things. A mother?

He: All mothers.

She: Not all. A daughter?

He: All daughters.

She: All of them?

He: Yes, all women.

She: Scabby ones, dogs?

He: Details don't matter.

She: Ones with a mustache?

He: All women with cunts.

She: That's no way to talk about aunts and grandmothers.

He: Women. The Woman.

She: It's upsetting, exhausting, all those bodies, a forest. I get lost in there.

He: You've risen above. Stay there. Hold on.

She: It's a godamn strain.

He: It's your place.

She:   Stepladder girl.

He: I don't want you slipping down, doing that again.

She: What you want, what you want.

He: What both of us want.

She: How can I want this pain?

He: Tell me then on your own what you want.

She: You're hurting me.

He: You see. On your own you don't want anything. It hurts you to know that.

She: I meant you were hurting my toe with your boot.

He: Dig in. Clench your calf muscles.

She: Leave me be.

He: I help you. I tell you what you want.

She: You think that alone I'm nothing.

He: Alone you're very small.

She: How can you say that? Look, here I am and you say I'm nothing.

He:     Oh, you're something, but nothing much on your own.

She: Look at me, is this nothing much?

He: One of those trees in that forest.

She: Look at me, forget what we said.

He: You loomed above us, draped, full and happy.

She:    Loomed? I can't take any more of this.

He: We couldn't touch you but we knew you.

She: Like a statue. What he wants is holy plaster.

He: Don't go from church to church. This story belongs to us.

She: Not to me. I want out. You can keep the sky blue cloak.

He: Why were you happy then and unhappy now?

She: Go straddle a statue, a great big statue. Do it hanging from a mountain.

He: Don't lose control of yourself. You don't want to flounder about incoherent.

She: That's just what you have me doing.

He: I thought I made you understand.

She: It's as clear as a cloud.

He: I explained everything.

She: Tell me how I can do it without getting tired.

He: Why pretend you don't understand?

She: Maybe if you kinda’ addressed my misgivings with care in one line.

He: An individual woman is made more by becoming an emblem for all women.

She: Emblem?

He: Yes, no statues. One woman who is all women.

She: Where am I in all that?

He: You're the one, the one woman, Woman.

She: No. Have it any way you like. But without capital letters. They throw me.

He: Pay less attention.

She: Punctuation I can take. But a capital letter in the middle of things floors me.

He: The trick is not to see all the small letters.

She: All those different faces and hairy heads, good and bad legs, cellulitis, heart-shaped lips and pairs of nipples lined up for miles.

He: The one, not the many.

She: This emblem, what's she like?

He: A big girl with good teeth.

She: You like them tall.

He: Ears that go with her nose.

She: I know the type.

He: A light in her eyes.

She: Where did you meet her?

He: Dignity in her shoulders.

She: A pickup?

He: Serious breasts.

She: The office party?

He: Down-home thighs ready to take off.

She: She's the chrome girl on the car radiator.

He: Right. An emblem.

She: Being metal polished is no life.

He: Best of all, her smile.

She: How's that?

He: An enigma.

She: Simple explanation, please.

He: Her smile says she knows what I'm thinking but I don't know what she's thinking.

She: Is that true?

He: How could I know what all women are thinking? Everything is behind that smile. Nothing is excluded.

She: And what does she know you're thinking?

He: That I can't do without her.

She: That should please her, though it doesn't mean much since she's everybody's mother, sister, wife, daughter and female whatnot.

He: It's not that it pleases her. She takes it as her due.

She: Tell me about her whoring.

He: It goes with the rest.

She: That's odd. Does she enjoy it?

He: Her due again.

She: You can't be serious.

He: It's part of worshipping her.

She: When does the money change hands?

He: You don't tip a goddess.

She: They pass a collection plate, I suppose.

He: It's attention she wants, respect.

She: But how does it work in practice?

He: She smiles and looks down. Nothing could be simpler.

She: I know all that.

He: Then you know enough.

She: In practice there would be problems.

He: The imagination can solve them.

She: Okay, wise guy, how would she dress for the role?

He: Leave particulars. Forget hairdos. Her style includes them all.

She: Coiffures. I've seen that showoff stuff.

He: Lift your eyes or you'll never see.

She: So she's dressed. Who takes her clothes off?

He: She's not a teenage virgin learning the ropes.

She: I see. She's a tough case and an athlete with all that climbing.

He: Of course nothing would be happening at all if she didn't manage to stay up in her place.

She: What next?

He: The male explores her.

She: That was on the cards

He: Exploration leads to discovery.

She: And staking a claim.

He: Discovery is celebration. He's not possessive.

She: Scared, he is. Who could blame him. She'd be quite a handful, roughly half the world population.

He: Making an inventory is paying homage.

She: What's she doing while he takes her measurements?

He: She's not doing, she's being.

She: In other words, still only smiling.

He: Only? Without her smile the universe is empty.

She: It will never be empty with you around. You'll stuff it with words.

He: Not words, imagining, desire.

She: Those are words, your words. They're what weighs me down, flattens me.

He: Be careful. Watch what you're going to say now.

She: This smile. What happens to it when, say, she's got a bellyache?

He: You're doing it again, sliding, dropping.

She: Well for chrisake, doesn't she ever get tired smiling?

He: You're going to lose your purchase altogether.

She: Or don't her feet ever hurt? Mine do today.

He: You've lost it.

She: It's always a mistake to buy cheap shoes.

He: We're at pavement level.

She: My mother was right in that at least.

He: On all fours.

She: But the styles she picked!  Awful.  And little yours truly had to wear them.

He: Do me a favor and don't bring in your mother's feet.

She: I thought you liked women's feet, all women's feet.

He: This is intolerable.

She: So what does that much-fucked emblem of yours wear on hers? Sandals, I suppose, Greek sandals with thongs.

He: Go ahead then, pick between your toes. But leave your mother's alone, please.

She: Thongs, ancient Greek thongs right up to her swollen knees. Whore is right. Think of the diseases. A bloody main sewer she'd be.

He: All right, hit the bottom then.

She: How old is she anyway?

He: Your mother's age.

She: Any kids?

He: A grown son she calls Sonny. She doesn't like his girlfriend.

She: Has she a daughter?

He: A year and nine months younger than Sonny. The daughter doesn't know how to handle men, according to the old girl.

She: Is the daughter married?

He: Divorced. Her mother wants grandchildren but has given up on her.

She: Banking on Sonny?

He: Yes, she's sure the boys will look like him.

She: And the girls?

He: Like her, Sonny's mother.

She: I hate women like that.

He: So here we are in the muck, crawling on our bellies.

She: When's Sonny getting married?

He: Not too soon because you shouldn't rush into things, not too late because you have to settle down sometime.

She: I had an aunt like Sonny's mother.

He: Did aunty have the same kind of corns as you mother?

She: Don't be offensive.

He: We're working our paunches into the dirt to get lower.

She: Do I badmouth your family?

He: It's you who hate your mother. I just go along out of sympathy.

She: And your family? Two brothers, I seem to remember. One a pimp and the other queer, if my memory serves me.

He: Mother of God, we're eating the dirt out of the muck. See, our tongues are black.

She: Can't you just imagine those sex twins, close up, fore and aft, to the old emblem. Sorry, Emblem.  There they are, one behind trying to get up her backside and the other out front selling tickets for the main attraction.

He: You think you are at the very bottom. It's not true. You can always sink lower.

She: And the old man. Tampered with juvenile skirt, as I recall. Wasn't he booked for peeing on the dahlia beds while he was out on the town?

He: Rock bottom, everything eaten. Please let's not bounce our heads on the granite.

She: And youuuuuu, you low mother.

He: Let us pray.

She: Hold it, a moment

He: Hi Mary, hi Grace...

She: Till I'm ready.

He: We're with you...

She: In your fruit bowls.

He: Take our respects...

She: To the orphan goddess...

He: Our only queen.

She: Tell her to stand high and straight...

He: Forever, amen.

She: I'm tired.

He: Please don't do it again.

She: It's too much for me.

He: You're wrong. It's easy.

She: For you maybe.

He: Easy for you, harder for me.

She: Are you tired?

He: Always.

She: Okay, tell me again. After the smile...

He: It's not that she's tall, but that she's central. From wherever we look, we look toward her.

She: Not tall, central.

He: Everything comes to us through her.

She: Everything through her.

He: Including the generations to come. But we don't beg them of her.

She: Grants future generations as a byproduct.

He: Our wish is always to get deep within her.

She: Her center is your goal.

He: I said our goal.

She: If you say so.

He: But we never succeed.

She: But you keep trying.

He: We, we keep trying. It's our destiny, human destiny.

She: He says it's human destiny.

He: The destiny of all of us.

She: The destiny of all of us, he says.

He: Didn't that make you feel better?

She: To start with. Then I got tired.

He: Try to dig in.

She: Dig? Like with a shovel?

He: You're doing it again, stopping.

She: She always bought them too big.

He:    Wait.

She: Shoes, my mother.

He:    You’re going down again. Hold on.

She:   I’d grow into them, she said.

He:    Wait. You can start again.

She:  I can’t move.

He:   Touch your forehead. Tilt it up.

She: The family had big feet. She looked at mine and shook her head.

He:  Stop it.

She: Her mother’s were huge, she said.

He:  Wait!

She: My father’s side, too.

He: No!

She: It was life she said, and had a good laugh at me. My hard luck.