photo by Joe Mazza and Brave Lux

Tuesday, April 23, 2019

Notre Dame


Notre Dame
by Jacob Juntunen

Characters:
PERSON: Anyone.
Setting:
A bench. A bucket of water. A piece of paper (the script). A lighter.

                                                            PERSON
It’s extremely illegal to have an open flame on stage here.
I definitely should not burn this piece of paper.
Though I have the water to put out the flame, if necessary.
PERSON lights the lighter. The flame is real.
                                                            PERSON
Paper can last hundreds of years. Unless it burns.
But this is just one piece of paper. One among millions. Why not let it burn?
On this piece of paper is the only copy of the prayer I gave when I became a Christian.
On this piece of paper is the only sketch in the world of the statue that inspired that prayer.
But everything returns to ashes eventually.
PERSON lights the lighter.
                                                            PERSON
If it burned, why mourn it more than another?
If it survives, I can show it to my daughter one day.
This piece of paper can hold legacies and generations.
Paper can endure.
But paper can be destroyed so easily. It is so perishable.
PERSON lights the lighter… Then plunges the paper into the water.
                                                            PERSON
If I want my daughter to know my prayer, my statue, my history, I will have to recreate it for her.
Blackout.