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You Got OlderA Play
MAE: I used to have a fantasy where my high school boyfriend Dave Gellatly – who totally cheated on me and like destroyed all of my self-confidence – would come to my window and knock on my window and then I would let him in and then he would be high on cocaine (even though I’m pretty sure he never did cocaine) and he would like rape me? And the whole time I’m thinking: Maybe I should scream! If I scream, my parents will wake up and come down here and save me and this whole thing will stop. But then if my parents come down here, they’ll see me naked with Dave on top of me. And I’m like a virgin. And super Christian. So I don’t scream. Because I’m too embarrassed. And he rapes me. And then later I decide to report it. And the whole town vilifies me and I’m like this outcast woman? And then Dave dies in a drunk driving accident and everyone is like: If you had just not reported it he would have died anyway and you would’ve gotten justice without having to besmirch his name
MAC: That was a fantasy?
MAE: I guess I just used to think about it when I needed to cry
You Got OlderPremiered in2014 -
You Got OlderA Play
HANNAH: It's weird when someone you hate dies of cancer. I'm pretty sure I wished that he'd die of cancer. Like verbally wished that he'd die of cancer. More than once. Maybe several times. I'm pretty sure that I said he was fundamentally a force for evil. I'm pretty sure I said that if he died the world would get a net gain in goodness and purity and kindness and love. But yeah. I didn't mean it. I don't think I meant it. Maybe I meant it? I guess I did mean it. At the time. In any case. I'm sorry he died. I didn't want him to actually die. But anyway…
MATTHEW: The sweater didn’t kill him.
HANNAH: No. Maybe?
(Hannah pulls her baseball cap down.)
MATTHEW: It didn’t.
HANNAH: But it's not just me.
It’s everyone.
There is a curse.
You knit someone a sweater and they break up with you.
You Got OlderPremiered in2014 -
You Got OlderA Play
DAD: The thing that always gets me is this. You’re outside. You’re looking at the sky. And it’s a beautiful sky. You’re happy to be alive. You’re aware that you’re having a nice moment. That it’s a good moment in your life. But then how long should you let it go on, you know? Shouldn’t you just look at the sky forever? Or at very least until you get very hungry and you have to go do something else? But I’m always itching to go do something else even when I’m in the middle of having a nice moment. It makes me feel guilty.
(They sit.)
(Mae thinks about Damian who she fucked without a condom even though she didn’t really want to fuck him without a condom and how she put her legs over his shoulders. Or his legs over her…? No. His shoulders. Her legs over his shoulders.)
MAE: Should we go in?
You Got OlderPremiered in2014
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Night Sky in Exit WoundPoemsFrom"Aubade With Burning City"
A military truck speeds through the intersection, children
shrieking inside. A bicycle hurled
through a store window. When the dust rises, a black dog
lies panting in the road. Its hind legs
crushed into the shine
of a white Christmas.
On the bedstand, a sprig of magnolia expands like a secret heard
for the first time.
Night Sky in Exit Wound : Poems- Print Books
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Night Sky in Exit WoundPoemsFrom"Thanksgiving, 2006"
The mouth where I re-enter
this city. Stranger, palpable
echo, here is my hand, filled with blood thin
as a widow’s tears. I am ready.
I am ready to be every animal
you leave behind.
Night Sky in Exit Wound : Poems- Print Books
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Night Sky in Exit WoundPoemsFrom"Someday I’ll Love Ocean Vuong"
Don't be afraid, the gunfire
is only the sound of people
trying to live a little longer
& failing. Ocean. Ocean—
get up. The most beautiful part of your body
is where it's headed. & remember,
loneliness is still time spent
with the world.
Night Sky in Exit Wound : Poems- Print Books
- Find your local bookstore (via IndieBound)
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- Barnes & Noble
- Alibris
- E-Books
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