Beckett's Pooh by Samuel Beckett

           [Darkling stage.  A voice comes:]

Before Piglet.  During Piglet.  After Piglet.  Three Times I tell the tale of life with Piglet, without Piglet, without Piglet.

[A pause.  Darkling stage, fledgling light.]

Pooh:  Sanders is dead.  It is I who live under his name. Hush.  A visitor arrives.  No.  No one.  Perhaps my rectum.  People say nothing is impossible, but I do nothing everyday. Oh, bother. Bother? No bother to not build. Build with what. Too much wood and never enough. One-hundred acres, they say. But I’ll never know, stuck as I am in this hole. Stuck. Stuck, reaching for honey. Honey hole. 

[Looks at audience.]

They laugh. Oh, dear. Oh, dear. No. Nothing dear. Perhaps the bees will come. Perhaps they will come and they will sting my ruddy little bear face. Perhaps I’ll swell even larger then.  Perhaps I will become ever more stuck here. More stuck? Stuck more? My face swelled with pus, perhaps I’ll die just as my father died. Reaching for honey. Always there, out of reach. Fiddlesticks. Fiddlesticks. Fuck. Something has entered my rectum. I feel it crawling there. My mother was a sweet woman, sweet as honey, before my father fucked her. Fucked her rectum. Before I. Before I oozed from said rectum. Like honey. Honey. Honey stuck in the wood. As I. Stuck. Soon I’ll not be. Soon I’ll be not. Is it real love from the rectum? To put it there, put anywhere.  Anywhere better than nowhere?  Is it?  Is it real love from the rectum?

Piglet:  What ho Pooh, what ho!  Put it there, if you want it there.

[Looks at audience.] 

Pooh:  Laugh again. 

Pooh:  What rough bumbling tumbling beast comes bouncing on its bottom to put me on my ass, its hour come round at last?  Tigger tiggling tiger tigging.  Tiggles. Tiggles.  I’ll sit.  (screaming) PIGLET!  PIGLET!  Sound out the word now, purse my lips together, slight suckling of teeth, glottal stop. Pig. Pig. Lilting tongue to roof of mouth, flick against teeth, glottal stop. Let. Let. Pig. Let. Pig. Let. Pig. Let. Perhaps glottal stop is not the phrase I meant. PIGLET!

Piglet:  Pooh!  Pooh!

Pooh:  Piglet!  Piglet!  Where Piglet?  How Piglet?  Piglet come, come back, come first again Piglet, new Piglet, Piglet…

Piglet:  Ho Pooh!  Ho! 

Pooh:  What Piglet?

Piglet:  Nothing Pooh.

Pooh:  What Piglet?

Piglet:  Nothing Pooh, I just wanted to be sure of you.

Pooh:  Piglet!   Piglet!

Piglet:  Ho Pooh!

Pooh:  O phoo!  Pooh, I stuck in this hole, honeyhole.  Piglet is gone.  Pooh is alone.  Let’s sit down.

(Pause)

Pooh:  I used to believe in forever, but forever’s too good to be true.

Piglet:  (whispering)  Pooh!  Pooh!  We’ll be friends forever won’t we Pooh?

Pooh:  (authoritatively)  Even longer.  Even longer.  Longer than, at least, enough. And yet.

Pooh reaches the honey jar and honeys his hands, ejaculating grunts.

Pooh:  (ultimately articulate)  How lucky I am to have something to make saying goodbye hard.  Lucky.  Stuck but lucky.  Luck to be stuck. But what had luck to do.  Goodbye Piglet.  Goodbye Piglet.  Hard Piglet, without Piglet.  Hard luck stuck.  Goodbye.  Bye to bye, by and by. Again and again.

Piglet:  No Pooh.  Ho Pooh!  Here Pooh.  I, behind the light, Pooh.  In the shadow you cast, forgetting. Ho!  Ho!

Pooh:  Honey.

Piglet:  Honey.

Together: Honey.

(Pause.)

Piglet:  Promise me you’ll never forget me because if I thought you would, I’d never leave you.

Pooh:  Let’s sit.

(Pause.)

Piglet:  Ho Pooh!

Pooh:  Ho! What ho for honey pot.  What care for Pooh Bear. What ho. Start again.  Stuck again.

[Pooh handily retrieves pawful of honey, eats it snoutily, spilling.]

Piglet: Ho! I care!  I care for Pooh Bear!

Pooh:  Some people care too much. I think it’s called love. Does it care too much, in the rectum?

Piglet:  Ho Pooh, How do you spell it? Spell love?

Pooh:  You don’t spell it.  You feel it.  Feel it crawling.

Piglet:  Like rivers crawling.  Rivers know this.  Over the bones.  Licking.  No need to hurry.  We’ll get there one day.

Pooh:  Feel it.  Too much care.  So much honey.  Goodbye Piglet.  Hard Piglet.  Hard.  Let’s sit.  How lucky we are for this hard place.  Luck to be stuck between.  Between during.  Between after.  Yes.  No.  Even between before.  No.  No more.  Hard.

[Pause.  Darkling scene.  Fledgling light.  Light dies in the crib of the dark, a young light.]

[A voice comes from the dark:]

Pooh:  How now.  Pooh now.  Nevermore.  At last, not again.