Dragonflies

Ramneek Singh
Adapted by Swati Simha

A play in verse, based on the Punjabi poems:

Bootan di sarkaar (by Habib Jalib) and
Sabh ton khatarnaak (by Avtaar Singh Paash)

[Draft 1.0, Shanghai, March 2015.]

 The Death of Dreams / Ramneek Singh

Scene 1:

(C2 is cleaning a gun, C1 is washing clothes. C2 puts the gun on the floor. Looks
through the eye-piece.)

C2: Doesn’t the world look clearer through this? Like your mind is more focused.
Sharper. More precise.

C1: It always looked all blurry to me. Maybe that’s because I find it hard to keep one
eye shut.

(Showing the cloth he has been washing.)

C1: Does this look clean?

C2: Spotless.

C1: Really? Are you sure?

C2: You really seem to be having trouble with yo…u…r… I spy with my little eye
something beginning with D.

(C2 takes a thread out of his pocket and slowly approaches the back of a dragonfly.)

C1: 80% of the brain power of a dragonfly is used up by its eyes. It sees everything.
Sharp and precise.

(C2 catches the dragonfly)

C2: And yet they are the most gullible little pieces of shit! He sits there like a little
nitwit while I fasten the thread around him. I can even do it clumsily. He doesn’t
move. And once I’m done, he begins to fly! Up up and away! He flies when he knows
he can do nothing to escape me!

(C2 starts flying the Dragonfly. C1 stops washing and comes to enjoy the game.)

Beat.

C1: Don’t you want to go back home?

C2: Home? Are you mad?

Ever touched a bird’s nest when the bird was away? Just to play with it’s chicks?
When the bird returns she does not even touch her own babies. She can smell the
stench of human fingers.

C1: The smell of earth.

C2: Parched. Probably cemented.

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 The Death of Dreams / Ramneek Singh

C1: Come and watch! The deer is giving birth.

C2: and 1,2,3. Watch it be sacrificed by the chief.

C1: And after the sacrifice…

(C1 sings, C2 joins)

C1: The bugle calls.

C2: The sirens in the mine.

C1: The stories under the bed.

C1: Scraps of gold.

C2: Lodged in nails.

C2: The service to the masters.

C1: The jokes behind their backs.

(They swear in their mother tongue. They laugh.)

C2: The echos at the end of the canal.

(C1 sings a verse, C2 echos it)

C1: The fireflies under the stars.

C2: Dragonflies at the end of the thread.

Beat.

C1: That is how we came to this.

Our broken fingers wanting to hold onto something even more easy to break.

(Sound of boots marching)

C2: They’re here.

[The sound of boots marching on dry earth.]

C2: Come on. It’s time.

C1: I don’t want to.

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 The Death of Dreams / Ramneek Singh

C2: We have to keep moving. We’ll be left behind.

C1: Enough of these boots.

Enough of what they’ve done to our land.

Enough of matching footsteps with the boots.

(C1 picks up the gun and points it at C2)

C2: Yes. Enough of what they’ve done to us. Lets talk about it on our way back to
camp.

Pause

(C1 lowers the gun but doesn’t let go of the gun.)

C1: I’m not coming.

C2: What then?

C1: I don’t know but just not back there.

C2: I don’t see the point of/

C1: I’m not asking you to…

C2: (comes close to C1) I don’t want to do this either. But what else can we do?

C1: We can wait.

C2: and mourn?

C1: hold banners.

C2: they’re blind.

C1: Go hungry.

C2: Starve and die.

C1: Run.

C2: And hide?

Beat.

C2: Stories under the bed.

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 The Death of Dreams / Ramneek Singh

C1: The sirens in the mines.

C1: The service to the master.

C2: The jokes behind their backs.

C2: The echos at the end of the canal.

(C1 screams a blood curdling scream)

C2: 1, 2, 3.

(C1 falls to his knees. Cries)

C2: You can’t save them.

C1: But we have to try… try to undo what we did.

C2: But I don’t see the point of/

C1: There’s no point. No payback. No returns.

[C1 and C2 look at each other]

[The sound of boots marching becomes louder.]

C2: They are close. Let’s get out of here.

C1: They cannot see, nor hear.

C2: But they can smell.

Especially those who were on their side.

C1: They don’t distinguish.

C2: Nor think twice.

Beat.

C1: For they don’t do things that they don’t see the point of doing.

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 The Death of Dreams / Ramneek Singh

Scene 2:

[Victim 1 – a thirteen-year old boy – sitting next to a tub full of dirty utensils. He
gropes in the tub, finds a bone and starts nibbling on it. He looks at the audience and
starts singing in between biting on the leftover meat.]

Long, for these days I wait

when I get to eat what they ate.

I studied in a school
seventy miles away,
but I’d come home
to recover.
I had caught Malaria,
or had it caught me,
if you want to call it so.

Our house was on the other side

of the village well,
so we couldn’t hear
the shrieks.
A river flowed next to our house.
I would swim there,
not in the monsoons though.
The river resembled,
when it rained,
Shiva’s hair, unknotted, untied,
Water this high,
would wash away our house.
But not this year.
This year I was home,
if you want to call it so.

One morning,
I dropped my kanchaas
under the bed.
I was searching underneath
when they came
in jeeps
to civilise us,
if you want to call it so.

Thirteen in our family.

They caught the men
and beat them, until they bled.
Then one asked,
“In this house, live
any more men?”

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 The Death of Dreams / Ramneek Singh

So frightened was I,
I my pants did wet.
They came inside
but none under the bed looked.
One over my urine tripped, but
not underneath the bed looked.
I was lucky,
if you want to call it so.

They tied the men,

and made them watch
while they did things
my mother.
younger sister.
the elder.
And my aunt.

And I watched all of it.

All of it.
None of them cried,
if you want to call it so.

“How dare,
How dare you stand up?
If not one of us,
one of them you are,”
they said, and
made the men kneel,
and up went their hands.
My mother saw
through the underarm
of the man on top of her
and let out a scream.
A scream,
and then,
Another scream.
Thud!

A big victory, they said,

thirteen rebels shot dead.
No one will ever know
each was shot in the head
after he was already dead.

“In this house, live

any more men?”

Barely clothed bodies clothed,

only for a moment though,

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 The Death of Dreams / Ramneek Singh

uniforms flung over lifeless shoulders,

pictures clicked, lies fed.

And then,
someone fired another round
at a corpse wrapped in uniform.

A ruined uniform, an officer enraged.

The boy with the gun,
hired only a month back,
was outside led
and shot in the head.

“How dare,
How dare you stand up?
If not one of us,
one of them you are,”

Thud!

Her brain
lay open.
Blood from the undone skull spurted
like a fountain
with lights,
A fountain with lights,
if you want to call it so.

The water from the fountain,

when reached my feet,
I screamed, I screamed.

That was how they found me.

That was how they found me.

Long, for these days I wait

when their victory they celebrate,
for that one day,
I get to eat what they ate.

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 The Death of Dreams / Ramneek Singh

Scene 3:

C2: You know we can still go back. They won’t be far.

C1: We’ll apologise.

C2: Yes!

C1: Dear boots, We’re sorry that we felt just for a moment that we didn’t want to
wash your clothes and clean your guns while you raped and plundered our villages.

C2: No… We could say… We’re sorry that we felt just for a moment that we didn’t
want to rape any more of the ugly tribal women you gave us. That could work.

(C1 beats C2 in rage)

C1: Go back to the damn camp.

C2: I only meant it like an excuse. I didn’t… I didn’t mean it.

C1: Why don’t you go. Just…

Pause.

C2: When we left home/

C1: When we left home things were different. We were fools. We made promises we
could never keep.

Pause.

C2: We made just one promise.

(C1 is silent)

C2: Now that we’ve come away? What now? What has changed?

C1: Nothing. I told you no returns. No/

C2: But it’s just tiring.

C1: Tiring because you don’t see the point.

C2: It is tiring because we can’t do anything.

C1: We can’t do anything.

C2: So we live the life we best can.

C1: Keep looking ahead.

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 The Death of Dreams / Ramneek Singh

C2: March towards the lights.

C1: Progress!

C2: Do you remember the time when we didn’t know the gun becomes powerful only
when a man wields it?

C1: The time when we bowed to the supreme gun and feared it would fire even in the
absence of the squire.

C2: The shame.

C1: And look at us now. We’ve come far.

C2: We’ve learnt.

C1: Become civilised.

C2: We speak to one another with respect.

C1: We drink tea.

C2: We don’t sweat.

C1: Is that Civilized enough? Is your appetite whet?

Whet for consumption, whet for progress?
Whet enough to enslave another and make them sweat?

C2: But now we know how to wield the very gun we once feared.

C1: We wield it against our own,

burn those who are already seared.

Beat.

C2: If we weren’t the ones burning, we’d be the ones burnt.

C1: We burnt and burnt until we began to enjoy it.

C2: Our broken fingers wanting to hold onto something even more easy to break.

C1: There’s no hunger without gluttony

C2: And no gluttony without hunger.

(C2 begins to leave)

C1: You’re going back?

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 The Death of Dreams / Ramneek Singh

C1: “My Dear Sons,

Your eyes have been my light – from the day you were born to this very night. My
sons you’ve chosen cloudy days with stormy nights to fly your kite. But my sons you
say you’ve now picked your fight. My sons I won’t scold or beat or teach, it’s no
longer my right. My sons I call you my sons one last time, for I know I will lose them
tonight. With no mother to keep you close, don’t stray from each other’s sight. Battles
will come and go, you might have to switch sides. But as a mother’s last right,
promise me no matter what you’ll hold on to each other starting tonight.”

(C2 puts down his things.)

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Scene 4:

[Two men and a woman sitting on a bench. Victim 2 – an undeveloped foetus – walks
up to them.]

- Who are you?

- “I’m one of the victims.”
- She/He is lying.
- There were only 3 killed last night at the camp.
- And we are the three.

I don’t know about the numbers.

I can’t count.
How can I count?
I, who was not even properly born.

Maa, you must recognise me.

I cried inside you
when those men kept…
again and again,
one after the other.
23 men, Maa!
Or was it 24?
Because Maa,
I can’t count.
How can I count?
I, who was not even properly born.

I was inside,
crying,
for they were destroying
what was my home.
If I was not properly born,
nor unborn was I,
for I know,
those men were different.
Besides, they were only 15.
That is, if they said it right.
Because Maa,
I can’t count.
How can I count?
I, who was not even properly born.

I wanted to ask
just one thing:
Whose seed… (stops)
Fifteen men,
 The Death of Dreams / Ramneek Singh

one after the other.

Which one did the trick?
Would I ever know?
Would you ever know?
Would he ever know?
Is there a way to know?
Was it the seventh?
Were it the eleventh?
Because Maa,
I can’t count.
How can I count?
I, who was not even properly born.
Scene 5:

[C2 fires a shot.]

C1: What is wrong with you?

C2: I needed to know I still had it in me to shoot. That I was…

C1: Man enough?

C2: It used to feel nice.

C1: To shoot at whim?

C2: Kill and not be accountable.

[C2 fires another shot in air]

C2: The power of the gun.

C1: It’s not just any gun.

C2: THE gun.

C1: The one the boots taught us how to use.

(C1 pulls someone out of the audience)

C1: Try it now. Let’s see.

[C2 hesitates]

C2: I can’t.

C1: Why not?

C1: Are you scared?

C2: No.

C1: Yes you’re scared!

C2: Why should I be?

C1: Because you could go to court. Because you don’t have full impunity the way you
did with the boots.

C2: No! I’m not scared of black coats.

C1: Then what? Is he/she not black enough? Or not Muslim enough? Common Shoot.
 The Death of Dreams / Ramneek Singh

C2: I can’t.

C1: You can’t… Because you know they will haunt you.

C2: They don’t haunt me anymore. The ghosts have also grown tired.

[Silence]

C2: It’s guilt.

C1: Guilty because you would have sinned.

C2: Guilty because I know they haven’t sinned.

C1: You’ve begun to see and hear.

C2: Yes. But it is difficult to keep track.

[C2 fires in the air]

C2: I can’t control it.

[C2 shoots again]

C1: Stop it!

[C2 shoots]

[C1 ‘What?]

C2: You don’t know what it is like to live in shame.

C1: I Do.
Scene 6:

[Victim 4 – a bleeding penis – walks in. He looks at the audience awkwardly for a
while as if he wants to say something.]

I am a penis.

Yes, I know what you must be thinking.

But I am a penis. Yes, a penis.

I know you people have no respect for me anymore, but see, I didn’t come here to get
respect. I came here to get your help to find the man whose penis I am.

He was buying eggs from the market that evening

when they came
with swords.
They asked him his name.
He knew there was no way out.
So he made up a name.
When I heard that, I giggled.
They must’ve heard me,
for they asked him to show me to them.
And, you all can guess
what happened after that.

See, you got the guesses right.

Exactly.
Exactly that.
And then, one of them held me up and threw me far.

It took me days to crawl to that place, but I couldn’t find him.

Him, as in the man whose penis I am.

My name, you ask?

My name is victim number 10,976.
You see, victims don’t have names.
They only have numbers.
Whether they are men
or penises.

So you see, mine is 10,976.

That is, if I die before that man, the man whose penis I am.

Otherwise, I would be 10,977.

Complicated, isn’t it?

 The Death of Dreams / Ramneek Singh

That’s why I’m trying to find him,

because I have to go to the gods and ask for justice.

And without the proper victim number,

there may be confusion.
How will justice be dispensed
if I don’t even know if I’m
10,976
or 10,977 ?

Now that I think of it,

I’m wondering,
what would justice mean
for a penis?

No no,
I must stop this.
Thinking is the job of men,
not of penises.

The job of a penis

is to find the man
whose penis he is.

To do that, I must stay alive,

but in the meanwhile,
if anyone of you sees a man,
around 5’7”,
wheatish,
average built,
in mid-forties,
looking for his penis,
please tell him
I was looking for him.
Scene 7:

C2: Where next?

C1: I’m trying to figure out.

C2: Is that a map?

C1: No. The newspaper.

C2: And what do you see?

C1: Numbers.

C2: 1,2,3.
1,2,3.
1,2,3.

C1: (laughs) Our chiefs have found an easier way to count! 47 killed in so and so
place. 51 burnt alive on so and so day.

C2: Why don’t the Gods understand that they’re all corrupt!

C1: Gods?

C2 : Yes Gods.

C1: Don’t you know? Our Gods were on auction.

C2: auction?

C1: Going once, going twice, SOLD.

C2: Who bought it?

C1: The Big boot.

C2: I didn’t know. And here I was still doing my prayers.

C1: It’s now in the Boot history Museum.

C2: Of course! “In the next exhibit we can see the deity Shango on horseback.
Shango was a powerful and violent ruler. He reigned for seven years, the whole
of which period was marked by his continuous campaigns and many battles. The
end of his reign resulted from his own inadvertent destruction of his own
palace.“

C1: What are you telling them for? (pointing to the audience) They’ve probably been
to the Museum.
 The Death of Dreams / Ramneek Singh

C2: They are probably those who give charity to impoverished African babies!

C1: They probably listen to John Lennon.

C2: Imagine all the people living life in peace.

C1: They’re not like us.

C2: No They aren’t. They are not stuck in between.

They’re free.

C1: Because they are civilized. Educated. Not Barbaric like/

C2: Oh no no it doesn’t work that way. Not anymore.

There is something called a free market. At first a dunderhead like you might think it
is a place where you get things for free. But in fact it’s a market where you can buy
your freedom. They are free because they have the money to pay for it.

C1: Then maybe we can…

C2: Do you have the money?

C1: No but we can…

C2: Steal?

And Loot?

And Kill?

What else do we know?

C1: We know how to…

C2: Dig your bare hands.

C1: Scraps of gold, Lodged in nails.

C2: Pull the nails out.

C1: Lodged in flesh, what a mess.

C2: Buy a new nail,

C1: and glue to fix.

C2: Gold is gold!

C1: Buy flesh afresh.

 The Death of Dreams / Ramneek Singh

Pause.

C2: We’ll never be free.

C1: But we have to try. Try to undo what we did.

C2: And we’re undoing it by running away!

C1: I want to see and hear.

C2: We saw everything. 80% of our brain power directed to our sight.

C1: We saw it through the eyepiece. Sharp and precise.

C2: And we sat there quietly as the twine was wrapped around us.

C1: They even did it clumsily.

C2: And now we start to fly.

Pause.

C2: So where are we running next?

(C1 shrugs)

C2: Come on, hurry. The boots will find us.

C1: They already have.

C2: [looks confused]

C1: Don’t you see, the boots are everywhere.

In what we eat, in what we wear
In what we speak and how we swear
They no more march
Their guns don’t flare
We no more see the traps that ensnare
They’re now in society’s every layer

C2: In what we eat, in what we wear

In what we speak and how we swear

From seeds, to pills

and parliamentary bills

The boots are guardians of our wills.

 The Death of Dreams / Ramneek Singh

C2: How do we fight what we can’t see?

C1: Omniscient, gaseous and sultry.

C2: How do we know we’re even fighting?

C1: We don’t.

C2: Maybe they own our needles and threads too.

C1: Our books and banter too.

C2: Our songs and questions too.

C1: Maybe.

C2: (hysterical) We should forget this. There’s no use.

C1: After all that we’ve heard?

C2: Maybe we should leave all this and go back. Come to terms with the way the
world is. This is how it is. This is how we need to live. We can only carve out a silent
space in us and go on living.

C1: (laughs) Go on living…

(the sound of the boots marching)

C2: They’re here again.

C1: The most treacherous is not the robbery

of hard earned wages.
The most horrible is not the torture
by the police.
The most dangerous is not the fist
of treason and greed.

To be caught while asleep is surely bad.

Surely bad is to be buried in awful silence.
But it is not the most dangerous.

To be silenced
in the noise of trickery,
even when just,
is definitely bad.
Surely bad is reading in the light of a mere firefly.
But it is not the most dangerous.
 The Death of Dreams / Ramneek Singh

The most dangerous is to be filled with dead peace.

Not to feel desperation.
To bear it all.
Leaving home for work
and from work, return home.

The most dangerous is the death of our dreams.

The most dangerous is that watch

that runs on your wrist
but stands still for your eyes.

The most dangerous is that eye

that sees all but remains frost-like,
whose sight forgets to kiss the world with love,
that gets lost in the blinding mist
arising out of material objects,
that consumes the visible simplicity,
that is lost in aimless things.

The most dangerous is the song

that in order to reach your ears
overpowers a mourning wail,
and at the door of a frightened people,
coughs like a knave.

The most treacherous is not the robbery

of hard earned wages.
The most horrible is not the torture
by the police.
The most dangerous is not the fist
of treason and greed.

C2: The most dangerous…

is
the death of our dreams.

The most dangerous is the death of our dreams.

C1: What are you doing?

C2: Stupid as they are. They don’t give up. They fly until their wings give in against
the tension of the thread.
 The Death of Dreams / Ramneek Singh

What are you waiting for? Get washing. We have to wash the stench off our clothes
before we can go back home.

C1: But we might dirty our fingers trying to wash them off.

C2: We have to no choice.

[The sound of the boots approaching]

[C2 whips the clothes clean. The whips the sound of gunshots.]

THE END.