[Hannah Pitt approaches a Homeless Woman]
Hannah Pitt:
Excuse me. I said excuse me. Can you tell me where I am? Is this Brooklyn? Do you know a Pineapple Street or is there some train or bus I...? [sets down bags exaustedly]
Hannah Pitt:
I'm lost. I just arrived from Salt Lake City. [beet]
Hannah Pitt:
Utah? I took the bus I was told to take and I got off... well it was the very last stop so I had to get off and I asked the driver was this Brooklyn and he nodded yes. But he was from one of those foreign countries where they think it's good manners to nod at everything, even if you don't know what it is you're nodding at. In truth I think he spoke no English at all... which I think would make him ineligible for employment on public transportation, you know with the public being English-speaking... mostly. Do you speak English.
Homeless Woman:
[nods yes]
Hannah Pitt:
Well I was supposed to be met at the airport by my son and he didn't show. And I don't wait more than three and three quarters hours for anyone, so I should have been more patient... I guess. But is this...
Homeless Woman:
Bronx.
Hannah Pitt:
[confused] Is that The Bronx? How in the name of Heaven did I get to The Bronx? When that drive...
Homeless Woman:
-slurp... slurp... will you stop that disgusting slurping, you disgusting slurping animal, feeding yourself. What would it matter to yourself or anyone if you just stop feeding and DIED!
Hannah Pitt:
Can you just tell me...
Homeless Woman:
Why was the Koziuscko Bridge named after a Po-lack?
Hanna:
I don't know what you're talking ab...
Homeless Woman:
It was a joke.
Hanna:
Well what's the punch line?
Homeless Woman:
I don't know.
Hanna:
Oh for Petes' sake! [to the street]
Hanna:
Is there anyone who can tell me...
Homeless Woman:
[yelling to no one in particular] Stand further off you fat loathsome whore, you can't have any more of this soup slurp slurp slurp you animal, and I know you'll just go pee it all away and where will you do that behind what bush! It's fucking cold out here and I- [gulp]
Homeless Woman:
... not right because I'm supposed to live in a tunnel. [to Hannah]
Homeless Woman:
You're not very funny. Have you read the propecies of Nostradomus?
Hannah Pitt:
Who?
Homeless Woman:
Some guy I once went out with somewhere. Nostradomus... prophet... outcast... eyes like scary shit, he would...
Hannah Pitt:
Shut up! Please stop jabbering for one minute and pull your wits together and tell me how to get to Brooklyn, because you know and you're going to tell me because there is no one else around to tell me and I'm cold and I'm wet and I'm very, very angry. So I'm sorry that you're psychotic but just make an effort. Pull yourself together and take a deep breath. [Homeless Woman stares dumbfounded at Hannah]
Hannah Pitt:
Do it!
Homeless Woman:
[stuggles to take in a breath]
Hannah Pitt:
Good. Now exale. [blows air out of her mouth]
Homeless Woman:
[Tries to mimic Hannah's exhaling with mixed results]
Hannah Pitt:
Now tell me how to get to Brooklyn.
Homeless Woman:
Hmmm... don't know. [Hannah slumps defeatedly]
Homeless Woman:
Want some soup?
Hannah Pitt:
Manhattan? I don't suppose you know the address of the Mormon Visitor Center.
Homeless Woman:
65th and Broadway.
Hannah Pitt:
How do you know that?
Homeless Woman:
I go there all the time. Free movies. Boring, but you can stay all day.
Hannah Pitt:
Well how can I get there?
Homeless Woman:
Take the D train. Next block take a right.
Hannah Pitt:
Thank you. [Hannah picks up her bags and starts walking away. Homeless Woman dumps out the rest of her soup and throws the empty container in to a bin, startling Hannah]
Homeless Woman:
In the new century, I think we will all be insane. [Hannah hurries away as fast as she can]
[Andrew transcendentally describes his favorite opera]
Andrew Beckett:
Do you like opera?
Joe Miller:
I'm not that familiar with opera.
Andrew Beckett:
This is my favorite aria. This is Maria Callas. This is "Andrea Chenier", Umberto Giordano. This is Madeleine. She's saying how during the French Revolution, a mob set fire to her house, and her mother died... saving her. "Look, the place that cradled me is burning." Can you hear the heartache in her voice? Can you feel it, Joe? In come the strings, and it changes everything. The music fills with a hope, and that'll change again. Listen... listen..."I bring sorrow to those who love me." Oh, that single cello! "It was during this sorrow that love came to me." A voice filled with harmony. It says, "Live still, I am life. Heaven is in your eyes. Is everything around you just the blood and mud? I am divine. I am oblivion. I am the god... that comes down from the heavens, and makes of the Earth a heaven. I am love!... I am love."
[Ethel Rosenberg walks into the room]
Roy Cohn:
Aw, fuck. Ethel.
Ethel Rosenberg:
You don't look so good, Roy.
Roy Cohn:
Well, Ethel. I don't feel so good.
Ethel Rosenberg:
But you lost a lot of weight. That suits you. You were heavy back then. Zaftig, mit hips.
Roy Cohn:
I haven't been that heavy since 1960. We were all heavier back then, before the body thing started. Now I look like a skeleton they stare at.
Ethel Rosenberg:
The shit's really hit the fan, huh, Roy? The fun's just started.
Roy Cohn:
What is this Ethel, Halloween? You trying to scare me? Well you're wasting your time 'cause I'm scarier than you are any day of the week! So beat it, Ethel! Boo! Better dead than red! Somebody trying to shake me up? Hm, hm? From the throne of God in heaven to the belly of hell, you can all fuck yourselves and then go jump in the lake because I am not afraid of you or death or hell or anything!
Ethel Rosenberg:
I'll be seeing you soon, Roy. Julius sends his regards.
Roy Cohn:
Yeah, well send this to Julius! [Roy flips her the bird]
Ethel Rosenberg:
You really are a very sick man, Roy.
Carter Chambers:
[in his letter to Edward] Dear Edward, I've gone back and forth the last few days trying to decide whether or not I should even write this. In the end, I realized I would regret it if I didn't, so here it goes. I know the last time we saw each other, we weren't exactly hitting the sweetest notes-certain wasn't the way I wanted the trip to end. I suppose I'm responsible and for that, I'm sorry. But in all honestly, if I had the chance, I'd do it again. Virginia said I left a stranger and came back a husband; I owe that to you. There's no way I can repay you for all you've done for me, so rather than try, I'm just going to ask you to do something else for me-find the joy in your life. You once said you're not everyone. Well, that's true-you're certainly not everyone, but everyone is everyone. My pastor always says our lives are streams flowing into the same river towards whatever heaven lies in the mist beyond the falls. Find the joy in your life, Edward. My dear friend, close your eyes and let the waters take you home.
[last lines]
Jerry Willis:
"Then Jesus declared, 'I am the Bread of Life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty. For as I told you, you have seen me still you do not believe. All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away. For I have come down from heaven not to do my will, but the will of Him who sent me.'"
Brody Sutton:
I remember the thrill of driving my car, the pleasure of friendship, the touch of a woman who loved me. I remember the words of a man named Elijah Cohan, the man who told me about Jesus Christ. I remember, but it's like a dream, a dream from long ago, and it's fading. I still remember the last free choice I ever made. [insert showing Brody took the implant]
Brody Sutton:
It was the wrong choice.
Alix:
I found out how hard it is to change, really change. Even hell can get comfortable if you're used to it. All I wanted my whole life, was for that lonliness inside me to go away. But, it never did, no matted what I drank, or what drug I took, or where I went, who I was with. We all need something to help us get through life. All I needed was to find the right thing to rely on, something that would never go away, something I would never run out of. Turned out to be the same thing for everybody. And the funny thing was, it was there all the time, in those little glimpses of heaven in every day... In the smile of a stranger, the green of the trees, the advice of a friend, the laughter of a child, the help of a neighbor, the plane that arrived safely.
Jamie Buchman:
Oh my god, don't ever die. 'Give me my Romeo, and when he shall die, take him and cut him out in little stars, and make the face of heaven so fine that all the world would be in love with night.' Did I ever tell you I played Juliet in the fifth grade? I did. Opposite Steven Palumbo's Romeo. Oy. What an actor he was. He started crying during my monologue when he was supposed to be dead, because he said I was leaning on his arm. Oh my god, don't ever die. I have so much more to tell you, and I'm not interested in telling it to anyone else. And I'm not saying I'd be helpless. I mean, I'm bright and fairly good with money. I mean, I guess I'm cute, right? You would say, 'What, are you kidding me? You, my little friend, are a perfect example of beautiful.' And so I am. ' Cause I am nothing more or less than what I see in your eyes when you look at me. Do you know how long I waited for you? My mother used to say I was too picky, or afraid of commitment, and that's why I was still unmarried by the age of almost 30. But the truth is, I was just looking for you. Do you know how close I came to being a narrow, cold, mistrustful woman? But you have given me a life so big and full and good... and fun! I don't even know what we do, really, besides clean up and complain and wish we were sleeping, but with you, somehow... fun. And I'll tell you a secret. When we got married, I couldn't imagine still wanting to be with anyone all this time later. But I do. It's a miracle to me. You are a miracle. You've made me happy. Which is something I never, ever thought I'd be.
Once the creator was removed from the creation, divinity became only a remote abstraction, a social weapon in the hands of the religious institutions. This split in public values produced or was accompanied by, as it was bound to be, an equally artificial and ugly division in people's lives, so that a man, while pursuing Heaven with the sublime appetite he thought of as his soul, could turn his heart against his neighbors and his hands against the world...
Though Heaven is certainly more important than the earth if all they say about it is true, it is still morally incidental to it and dependent on it, and I can only imagine it and desire it in terms of what I know of the earth.
(pg. 23,
