Having my way with Ulysses

The happy demise of all unhappy marriages.

Certaine Lordes came downe into thẽ nether houſe, and expreſſely declared cauſes, The marriage betwixt the King and the Lady Anne of Cleue, adiuged vnlawfull. for the which, the mariage was not to be taken lawfull: and in concluſion, the matter was by the conocation cleerely determined, that the King might lawfully marrie where he would, and ſo mighte ſhe. And thus were they clearely diuorſed, and by the Parliament it was enacted, that ſhee ſhoulde bee taken no more for Q. but called the Ladye Anne of Cleue10:10 pm

Scene: [In the house that Jack built, you know the one, where comes the fire that burns up the staff, that beat up the dog, that bit the cat, that ate up the goat — the one my father bought for two zuzim, in the house that Jack built.  In the house that Jack built (Conference Room C, Holy Mother Public Relations Inc.) Eve, Mary, Peter Piscator, Joseph the Joiner, and William Haley celebrate the sudden – at – the – moment – though – from – lingering – illness –  often – previously – expectorated – divorce of Adam and Eve.]

William Haley:  [Filling cups, some decline but Mary is front and center.  No surprise there.] Friends, let us raise a glass to this occasion of Eve and Adam’s postcreation.  Here’s to Eve who is like a flame of many colors of precious jewels, to Adam

Eve: Do we have to toast to Adam?

William Haley: To the vicar of Rome and of Bray, and to all our deceased friends who are more really with us than when they were apparent to our mortal part.  And to

Mary: [Thirstily] Here here!

[All quaff from their mazers]

St Bernard:  The cake is delicious, Peter, did you make it yourself?

Peter Piscator:  No. No, no.  I got it for a song.  Just a penny pippin.

Joseph the Joiner:  Really?  It looks like it would have set you back at least $50.  Although I find it a bit subsubstantial.

Mary:  I find you a bit subsubstantial.

William Haley:  None of that Mary.  Tonight is for Eve’s happiness, which has wings and wheels.  Miseries are leaden legged and their whole employment is to clip the wings and to take off the wheels of our chariots.

Eve:  That’s beautiful, William.  Did you just come up with that now?

Peter Piscator:  No, no.  No.  That sounds like he stole it from what’s his name, that devoted rebel. You know, the enthusiastic hope-fostered visionary.

William Haley:  You are quite wrong sir, and you injure me in your so saying.  But I shall ignore you.  A blight never does good to a tree and if a blight kill not a tree but it still bear fruit let none say that the fruit was in consequence of the blight.

Mary:  Jeepers Chrysthanthemum.  Somebody cut that cake, will you.  Let’s get this party going.

Joseph the Joiner:  Let’s not Mary.  Last time you ended up in bed with a pigeon.

Mary:  That was a rumor started by Leo Taxil.  Please.  What’s it to you if I knew God or I didn’t know God or if I had a pregnancy without joy, a birth without pain, a body without blemish, a belly without bigness.  You want to know if I still have a hymen?  Come and look!

Joseph: With will will we withstand withsay.

Mary:  Oh for the love of Christmas somebody hand over the cake.

William Haley:  For as man liveth not by bread alone, Mary, I shall live although I should want bread.  Who is that hiding under that table?

St. Bernard:  Mary! Mary!  You are the mother of the word incarnate, despise not my petitions, but in thy mercy hear and answer me

Mary:  St. Bernard.  He’s become the creature of my creature.

Eve:  Creepy.  Let’s get rid of him.

William Haley:  We can’t get rid of him.  Time’s ruins build eternity’s mansions.  He like us all is the word made flesh.  Get rid of the flesh and he’ll become word for all eternity connected to us all as by navelcord to navelcord entwining back to Eve.

Mary:  Well now I don’t want cake anymore.

Eve:  Who invited that guy?

Noble words coming. Look out. Could you try your hand at it yourself?

12:46 pm

[Scene:  Atop Mount Pisgah in Madaba, Jordan, two men gaze to the west and the southwest and reminisce.]

Manetho:  This view transfigures the soul.  Do you have a light?

Moses:  Use the bush.  Yes, soultransfiguring.   I never lived there you know.  I came this close.

Manetho:  Frustrating.

Moses:  Yup.

Manetho:  [bends over the flames, his unglazed linen collar appears behind his bent head soiled by his withering hair.  He rises and the men smoke together, their smokes ascending in frail stalks that flower with their speech]  Handy, that.  Yes, so close.  And for what dear Moses?  Why did you Jews not accept our culture, our religion, our language.  We were the greatest, the biggest, the baddest of them all.  What were you?  Not much.  No wealth, no country, no nothing.  Primitives.  Babies.  We had ages of history, polity, priesthoods, literature.  It boggles, your choice, it boggles the mind.

Moses:  I died here.  No I didn’t enter the land I was promised.  I died instead, a sudden-at-the-moment-though-from-lingering-illness-often-previously-expectorated-demise.

Manetho:  And with a great future behind you.  You must feel such regret.  All this way, intoxicated by an obscure idol.  And just one, imagine!  We had Isis!  We had Ammon Ra!  Not to mention Osiris, Horus, Anubis, Seth, Nut, Thoth.  I could go on.  As above so below.  How can you Jews create a civilization with just one deity?  And we had more.  We were strong with armies and with ships.  We had trade.  You were weak, plagued with daylabourers.  The world trembled at our name; they heard your name and said who?

Moses:  And then what?  As much as you rose you were destroyed, over and again.  You rose and you decayed.  We could have stayed and bowed our will and our spirit, and we could have prayed to your armies and deities.  Yes we might have stayed by the fleshpots tasting the salt bread.  And then?  And then?

Manetho: [belches] Then assimilation into Egyptian life.  You realize that even those things which are subject to decay are good.  Nothing can be corrupted if it were not in some way good.  And yet that which is corrupt is still good, for if a thing were deprived of all good, it would not exist at all.

Moses:  Ah, curse you!  That’s Saint Augustine.  And he is talking about the creations of the obscure idol we chose instead of your life, your will.  And that God of obscurity, that soultransfiguring God led us in a pillar of smoke, like these we create together, but singular and beautiful, swirling and undulating shapeless shapes.  We followed that pillar of cloud by day and left our house of bondage.  I spoke with the ineffable.  Have you any idea of that?  The eternal spoke to me on mountaintops.  On this one, here.  This very place.

Manetho:  You Jews became outlaws.

Moses:  We were  given the law, and we shine even now with the light of inspiration.  Had we stayed we would have been enslaved.  You did us evil, you Egyptians, and you tortured us, saddling us with punishing work.  Our God, the Pure One who dwells on high, raised up a community, a people beyond counting.  And let me ask you this, Manetho, whose name is more remembered: mine, or any in your lists of kings?

Manetho:  Ok.  Ok.  Next year in Jerusalem.

Moses:  You’d better believe it.

Manetho:  I do take exception to your last point.  What has ever been greater than Egyptian civilization or lasted so long?  And what people today are so kind, so beautiful.  But Moses, remember please, all things that rise must fall and then must rise and then must fall and then rise again and fall again.  The masters of the Mediterranean are fellaheen today.  We all have our day.

Moses:  We all have our day.