ACT II: The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust
May 25, 2016 19:19:56 GMT -5
Post by Bondo on May 25, 2016 19:19:56 GMT -5
Have you ever thought about drawing yourself a nice hot bath… and filling it with sudsy bubbles? And you turn out all of the lights. And you light yourself some candles. Really, really nice candles. You put on your favorite Fleetwood Mac album, mine would be Rumours. And then, just before Goldust Woman starts, you turn it up full blast. As loud as your radio will go. Then, you reach over, just past your half drank glass of red wine… and you reach for the razor. And then you dig it into your wrists. But you go up towards your elbow. You know, down the road not across the street… and, just as you get through the opening chorus of the best damn song off of their most successful album, you slink yourself down, just so your chin floats atop the now reddening water, and you close your eyes. Letting the last few moments of your life basking in the greatness that is Fleetwood Mac. When your head starts to bob, and you feel yourself fading, you’ll not only hear Stevie’s angelic voice… you’ll start to see the White Witch herself… dancing in her flowing gown. Her dirty blonde hair flying around her head.
Yeah, that doesn’t sound too horrible at all. That sounds like one of the best damn ways to go.
_________________________________
_____________________________________________
_________________
Our final dance is at hand, Aries.
Have we not gone around the ballroom enough times for you? Do you feel like we’ve got one last song to move to?
Our last encounter didn’t go as you planned. I remember it quite clearly. Leading up to it, the Starman was angry at me for failing to preach his gospel. He was angry at me for failing to end you. But why would I want to end you? You’re as beautiful as they come. A dark skinned Adonis with the body of a Greek soldier and the mind of a great philosopher.
I felt your words crawl over me like the spiders from Mars.
I felt your fists lay into me; I felt your anger and your rage and your disgust and everything else you tried to hide from the general public. I felt you insecurities. I felt that little twitch in your tights when I whispered more into your ear, every time you tried to end me.
You see, as virile and masculine as you are… you’re still human. You still have your feelings and you still have your desires. And while you can cry out how you’re not interested… you and I both know that without me, you wouldn’t even care anymore. You’re over the bitching and the mindless gab. You know deep down that I brought meaning back into your life. I gave you something to fight against. I gave you something to feel again.
I may not be your one true love, but face it. You’ve loved every fucking minute of me in your life.
We’ve had one previous go around and I walked away the victor. Things were not what they should have been, and in your eyes you were robbed. I walked away the victor and I walked away with something much more than you like to admit. Every moment since I have occupied your mind. Every waking minute of your life you see me there, my hand raised in victory. It eats you alive. And that’s why you’ve begged for our final dance.
The Starman has told me things must be different. I have to end you. I have to cut the string and end the suffering. I don’t want to call it lights out, Aries. I want to keep playing with you. I’m the cat and you’re my mouse and I have my paw across your tail. I love watching you struggle under the pressures of losing to me and the pressures of a society constantly questioning your manhood.
I don’t see a more perfect union anymore, Aries. I see a world cloaked in darkness, trying to free itself from an ever constant beacon of light. Hope doesn’t do anything for me and a promise of glory is useless. I want to play. I want color outside of the lines and roll around in the chaos I’ve seen and helped create.
One more go around the sun, Aries. You’ve got what you wanted. Here’s your opportunity to put me out of my misery and be the man you claim to be. You go ahead and you strut. You scratch yourself and you spit. However you have to do it to make yourself feel like a real man… but I want you to know one thing. While inside your head you’re questioning everything; your feelings, your sexuality, your worth as a human being. In my mind, you’ve always been perfect. There was never any doubt about that.
At Vertigo, look into my eyes and see that I’ve never once lied to you. I want you to see the sincerity in my whole self. I want you to hear my voice, the truth within it, when I tell you that you are my reason for being now. The screams from the Starman who told me to end you weeks ago have fallen mute. You’re my only reason now. In your eyes I see a beautiful future and in your voice I hear a beautiful tune.
At Vertigo we walk in for one final dance.
We cut a real rug last time… why don’t you lead this one?
My story began three weeks before my eighth birthday. It involved my father, my mother, and myself. It didn’t end in rainbows and unicorns. It ended with my kitchen cabinets being splattered in my father’s brain and my Power Rangers shirt soaked in my mother’s blood.
I still see her angelic face, pale, blood speckles and tears dried to her cheeks. The EMTs and Fire brigade had to pull me away from her. I wrestled to get back to her. Dug my fingers into the grown men keeping me from her. My older brother sat outside on our porch, crying, talking to this woman with a moustache.
But I kept clawing my way back to my mother. The look in my father’s eyes mocked me with their peacefulness. His neck and head hung lifeless over the back of the kitchen chair. The gun clutched in his hand, dangling over black and white checkered floor.
Three weeks before my eighth birthday I saw my world melt into emptiness around me. For ten years I bounced between mental hospitals and orphanages. Not a single person wanted to take a chance on me. I was broken, not even battered, but broken. My older brother suppressed everything for as long as he could before he enlisted in the army. In 2005 he died in Afghanistan, a hero. Trying to save the godforsaken country. He’s buried next to my mother. My father was cremated and placed in some obscure wall where the city puts the people nobody wants.
I saw one woman regularly for two years. I saw her cry and fall to pieces. She was the only person who hugged me because she cared. Not out of pity or not knowing what else to do. She was my shining light in an ever growing sea of darkness. Every time she was near, I felt my head above the water. As soon as she left, I felt the darkness overtake me.
When she transferred away from the Hillcrest Home, I succumbed to the darkness. I felt nothing. I tried killing myself three times. Each time I was foiled by nurses and cheap, shitty sheets that tore under the weight of me hanging from bar in my closet. I thought about getting a gun when I turned 18 and just offing myself that way… but I didn’t want to be any closer to my father. When I was finally released from the system I ran as far away from Massachusetts as I could. I hopped trains. I hitchhiked. I did odd jobs to pay my way across the country. I turned tricks. Handies to truckers. Whatever got me to California so I could find myself reunited with my one true person—the only one who ever gave a damn about me. When I knocked on her door in San Francisco, I came face to face with an older woman who was crying. I asked about Dr. Evie Noir. The woman let out a hysterical cry. After a moment I was informed that she was hit by a drunk driver during her morning run two days ago.
I felt myself feel something for the first time in 10 years. And then I felt it fade away as I swallowed down any tears that tried to fall, any sadness that tried to crawl itself up from my deepest, darkest feels.
I just turned and started walking. I found myself heading for the Golden Gate Bridge. I knew I was going to finally end it… my entire existence. My entire life of misery. I was going to jump into the water below; hoping the impact would kill me… otherwise I’d be fine falling into the darkness once more, and this time letting it consume my everything. On my way to my final chapter, I heard his voice.
The Starman called to me. He spoke to me. He told me that through all of this suffering, all of this horrible sadness, I grew into the specimen he needed. The one true beacon to spread his word unto the masses. He told me of all the Greek tragedies and how those heroes never had a happily ever after. He told me how happy ever after never happens; people don’t get the white picket fence and the unsetting sun. Everyone closes their eyes at the final hour. No one is exempt from paying the price that all men must pay.
In my darkest hours I still see my mother’s face. I see the look on her face as she died in my arms. I see her trying to comfort me as she lay bleeding out on our floor; in her final moments she tried to comfort me. Three bullets in her stomach and chest; and she cared about me more than herself. I wiped the blood away from her mouth and cradled her in my arms. The tears flowed like Niagara Falls.
I see Dr. Evie trying to help me back into the light during my darkest hours. Her words tried to guide me off from the ledge. Her hands were there, reaching out for me. But I never grabbed ahold. I always stood just out of reach. I see her crying in front of me during our tenth session. I can still feel her embrace as I let the emotions flow out of me for the first time following my mother’s death.
I wake up screaming in the middle of the night. Finding myself remembering all of this sadness and horror. The Starman doesn’t speak to me as often as he used to. I have trouble hearing him when he does.
I find myself listening to old records. Looking for something to help me feel again. To feel like I felt when Dr. Evie held me. Or when the Starman caught me.
Alcohol and drugs do nothing for me. The only thing that moves me now is music. And I find myself listening to Stevie Nicks. Her voice moves me; her words weave a web of emotions that hold me high enough up off from the ground to allow me to dangle my feet.
In my final hours, I hear the bath water running. I see the speckles of candlelight in the darkness. I smell the oakiness of a nice Cabernet. I hear the drums and her voice echoing in my chamber of peace.
Have I not pleased you, Starman?
Have I not done enough for you? Have I not done enough in your name?
Have I not drawn gasps from the crowd and left everyone standing, jaws agape?
Why is my clock striking midnight?
My day isn’t done! I don’t want to close my eyes!
I’ve done everything you’ve asked of me.
I’ve danced with the devil. I’ve sent him flowers and given him a teddy gram.
Be still my fucking heart! How could you do this to me?
Have I not praised your name? Have I not lived in your service?
You were my everything.
You saved me. You told me you loved me.
Again, I tell you, you were my EVERYTHING!
This is not how my story ends. My story ends on my own accord… it is not written to your liking.
No.
Nooo.
…
NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!
…
…
…
Please…
No.
Yeah, that doesn’t sound too horrible at all. That sounds like one of the best damn ways to go.
_________________________________
_____________________________________________
_________________
Our final dance is at hand, Aries.
Have we not gone around the ballroom enough times for you? Do you feel like we’ve got one last song to move to?
Our last encounter didn’t go as you planned. I remember it quite clearly. Leading up to it, the Starman was angry at me for failing to preach his gospel. He was angry at me for failing to end you. But why would I want to end you? You’re as beautiful as they come. A dark skinned Adonis with the body of a Greek soldier and the mind of a great philosopher.
I felt your words crawl over me like the spiders from Mars.
I felt your fists lay into me; I felt your anger and your rage and your disgust and everything else you tried to hide from the general public. I felt you insecurities. I felt that little twitch in your tights when I whispered more into your ear, every time you tried to end me.
You see, as virile and masculine as you are… you’re still human. You still have your feelings and you still have your desires. And while you can cry out how you’re not interested… you and I both know that without me, you wouldn’t even care anymore. You’re over the bitching and the mindless gab. You know deep down that I brought meaning back into your life. I gave you something to fight against. I gave you something to feel again.
I may not be your one true love, but face it. You’ve loved every fucking minute of me in your life.
We’ve had one previous go around and I walked away the victor. Things were not what they should have been, and in your eyes you were robbed. I walked away the victor and I walked away with something much more than you like to admit. Every moment since I have occupied your mind. Every waking minute of your life you see me there, my hand raised in victory. It eats you alive. And that’s why you’ve begged for our final dance.
The Starman has told me things must be different. I have to end you. I have to cut the string and end the suffering. I don’t want to call it lights out, Aries. I want to keep playing with you. I’m the cat and you’re my mouse and I have my paw across your tail. I love watching you struggle under the pressures of losing to me and the pressures of a society constantly questioning your manhood.
I don’t see a more perfect union anymore, Aries. I see a world cloaked in darkness, trying to free itself from an ever constant beacon of light. Hope doesn’t do anything for me and a promise of glory is useless. I want to play. I want color outside of the lines and roll around in the chaos I’ve seen and helped create.
One more go around the sun, Aries. You’ve got what you wanted. Here’s your opportunity to put me out of my misery and be the man you claim to be. You go ahead and you strut. You scratch yourself and you spit. However you have to do it to make yourself feel like a real man… but I want you to know one thing. While inside your head you’re questioning everything; your feelings, your sexuality, your worth as a human being. In my mind, you’ve always been perfect. There was never any doubt about that.
At Vertigo, look into my eyes and see that I’ve never once lied to you. I want you to see the sincerity in my whole self. I want you to hear my voice, the truth within it, when I tell you that you are my reason for being now. The screams from the Starman who told me to end you weeks ago have fallen mute. You’re my only reason now. In your eyes I see a beautiful future and in your voice I hear a beautiful tune.
At Vertigo we walk in for one final dance.
We cut a real rug last time… why don’t you lead this one?
_________________________________
_____________________________________________
_________________
_____________________________________________
_________________
My story began three weeks before my eighth birthday. It involved my father, my mother, and myself. It didn’t end in rainbows and unicorns. It ended with my kitchen cabinets being splattered in my father’s brain and my Power Rangers shirt soaked in my mother’s blood.
I still see her angelic face, pale, blood speckles and tears dried to her cheeks. The EMTs and Fire brigade had to pull me away from her. I wrestled to get back to her. Dug my fingers into the grown men keeping me from her. My older brother sat outside on our porch, crying, talking to this woman with a moustache.
But I kept clawing my way back to my mother. The look in my father’s eyes mocked me with their peacefulness. His neck and head hung lifeless over the back of the kitchen chair. The gun clutched in his hand, dangling over black and white checkered floor.
Three weeks before my eighth birthday I saw my world melt into emptiness around me. For ten years I bounced between mental hospitals and orphanages. Not a single person wanted to take a chance on me. I was broken, not even battered, but broken. My older brother suppressed everything for as long as he could before he enlisted in the army. In 2005 he died in Afghanistan, a hero. Trying to save the godforsaken country. He’s buried next to my mother. My father was cremated and placed in some obscure wall where the city puts the people nobody wants.
I saw one woman regularly for two years. I saw her cry and fall to pieces. She was the only person who hugged me because she cared. Not out of pity or not knowing what else to do. She was my shining light in an ever growing sea of darkness. Every time she was near, I felt my head above the water. As soon as she left, I felt the darkness overtake me.
When she transferred away from the Hillcrest Home, I succumbed to the darkness. I felt nothing. I tried killing myself three times. Each time I was foiled by nurses and cheap, shitty sheets that tore under the weight of me hanging from bar in my closet. I thought about getting a gun when I turned 18 and just offing myself that way… but I didn’t want to be any closer to my father. When I was finally released from the system I ran as far away from Massachusetts as I could. I hopped trains. I hitchhiked. I did odd jobs to pay my way across the country. I turned tricks. Handies to truckers. Whatever got me to California so I could find myself reunited with my one true person—the only one who ever gave a damn about me. When I knocked on her door in San Francisco, I came face to face with an older woman who was crying. I asked about Dr. Evie Noir. The woman let out a hysterical cry. After a moment I was informed that she was hit by a drunk driver during her morning run two days ago.
I felt myself feel something for the first time in 10 years. And then I felt it fade away as I swallowed down any tears that tried to fall, any sadness that tried to crawl itself up from my deepest, darkest feels.
I just turned and started walking. I found myself heading for the Golden Gate Bridge. I knew I was going to finally end it… my entire existence. My entire life of misery. I was going to jump into the water below; hoping the impact would kill me… otherwise I’d be fine falling into the darkness once more, and this time letting it consume my everything. On my way to my final chapter, I heard his voice.
The Starman called to me. He spoke to me. He told me that through all of this suffering, all of this horrible sadness, I grew into the specimen he needed. The one true beacon to spread his word unto the masses. He told me of all the Greek tragedies and how those heroes never had a happily ever after. He told me how happy ever after never happens; people don’t get the white picket fence and the unsetting sun. Everyone closes their eyes at the final hour. No one is exempt from paying the price that all men must pay.
I listened to him as I made my way to the Bridge. The sound of passing cars and the boats in the water made it hard to hear him sometimes. But I continued to listen. I looked out into the unending horizon. I didn’t see darkness. The sun had yet to set on this city by the bay. I heard him tell me how everything would change. I heard him discuss a better life for me; one with feeling and one with joy. I would laugh again. I felt a single tear fall down my cheek as I pulled myself up over the rail; my shoe slipping against the damp metal rail. I looked down into the water below. I thanked the Starman for his time; and I leaned forward. But just as I let go; I heard him say “I love you”. I felt him reach out and grasp me. There wasn’t a pesky nurse or a cheap sheet. This was a force of nature reaching out and saving me. Telling me that they loved me. Telling me that I existed for a reason.
_________________________________
_____________________________________________
_________________
_____________________________________________
_________________
In my darkest hours I still see my mother’s face. I see the look on her face as she died in my arms. I see her trying to comfort me as she lay bleeding out on our floor; in her final moments she tried to comfort me. Three bullets in her stomach and chest; and she cared about me more than herself. I wiped the blood away from her mouth and cradled her in my arms. The tears flowed like Niagara Falls.
I see Dr. Evie trying to help me back into the light during my darkest hours. Her words tried to guide me off from the ledge. Her hands were there, reaching out for me. But I never grabbed ahold. I always stood just out of reach. I see her crying in front of me during our tenth session. I can still feel her embrace as I let the emotions flow out of me for the first time following my mother’s death.
I wake up screaming in the middle of the night. Finding myself remembering all of this sadness and horror. The Starman doesn’t speak to me as often as he used to. I have trouble hearing him when he does.
I find myself listening to old records. Looking for something to help me feel again. To feel like I felt when Dr. Evie held me. Or when the Starman caught me.
Alcohol and drugs do nothing for me. The only thing that moves me now is music. And I find myself listening to Stevie Nicks. Her voice moves me; her words weave a web of emotions that hold me high enough up off from the ground to allow me to dangle my feet.
In my final hours, I hear the bath water running. I see the speckles of candlelight in the darkness. I smell the oakiness of a nice Cabernet. I hear the drums and her voice echoing in my chamber of peace.
_________________________________
_____________________________________________
_________________
_____________________________________________
_________________
Have I not pleased you, Starman?
Have I not done enough for you? Have I not done enough in your name?
Have I not drawn gasps from the crowd and left everyone standing, jaws agape?
Why is my clock striking midnight?
My day isn’t done! I don’t want to close my eyes!
I’ve done everything you’ve asked of me.
I’ve danced with the devil. I’ve sent him flowers and given him a teddy gram.
Be still my fucking heart! How could you do this to me?
Have I not praised your name? Have I not lived in your service?
You were my everything.
You saved me. You told me you loved me.
Again, I tell you, you were my EVERYTHING!
This is not how my story ends. My story ends on my own accord… it is not written to your liking.
No.
Nooo.
…
NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!
…
…
…
Please…
No.
