An Assignment for Student Playwrights

I told them to go listen to people talking,

To write exactly how some people really

Talked to each other, and one young man

Came to the next workshop, looking bewildered,

Holding his notes by thumbtip and fingertip

To avoid contamination. He said, "This

Is how they talked. They weren't actually

Having a conversation, just interrupting

Each other and saying whatever it was

They wanted to keep on saying. They had to decide

Today, here and now, like whether to go on

With this, this whatever-it-was they couldn't

Think of a name for. They kept looking

This way and that way, even at me (I wasn't

Anybody, just some student scribbling),

But never at each other. You could tell

They felt bad. They were making up their minds

About something important enough to change

Their lives maybe forever. But what was coming

Out of their mouths wouldn't have passed even

Junior high school English. They were both trying

To say what hurt, what was disappointing, what wasn't

Even common courtesy, let alone love.

If they'd been actors, good ones, they'd have been making

Contact. They'd have been improvising something

More interesting than shoving their chairs back

And standing up and trying to split the bill

But dividing it wrong, dropping it, picking it up,

And arguing all the way out. Now what the hell

Am I supposed to make out of this crap?"

Copyright Hudson Review Summer 2004
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