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TIME AND PLACE
Present. School auditorium. Five large (very large) monitors rest on a table at the front.
DR. RIVER
We are meeting like this,
as I said yesterday,
so that we can express our grief,
and shock,
and disbelief,
and questions. And, yes, maybe anger.
And I know the biggest question, besides “Why?” is
What do guns have to do with learning and high school?
As if none of us really knows guns.
So, today I’ve asked four of your classmates to prepare something to share.
And, like yesterday, no censorship. If things go too wrong, there’s the plug.
JOSÉ
Man in the mirror
I despise you.
Your dull, sunken eyes
Your imperfect, yellow teeth
Your cruel, hateful smirk.
I wish to start
And end
With you.
I want to consume you.
To pull you down.
To tie you down.
To burn you down.
Until your insults of me
Your prophecies of my future
Your doubts of my love
Are screams of agony.
Because when I melt your touch
Raze your sight
Tear your sound
Then I will smile.
With black boned
And empty socket and ashen teeth
I will be free of you.
DEWEY
I wish we could be free of that aching poem of yours, José.
That’s all I can say.
CHARM
I’ve walked. I’ve marched. All the way to Washington. The March for Our Lives.
And Dad and I have talked to Congressmen. And on TV. And to gun owners.
And gun owners have told us they support what we talk about.
Honest gun owners can see the need for action.
Honest gun owners are open to different views on sensible gun control.
DEWEY
There is no sense, like you say, in gun control.
Control freaks want to take guns away.
Because it’s something they can’t control.
Like all the other stuff they want to control in our lives.
Like marriage.
And bathrooms.
And Bibles in school.
And vaccinations.
And dead people voting.
And stealing elections.
And no walls where we need walls.
The American Dream sleeps with the Second Amendment.