Nonbinary characters
THE BODY from This Vessel Is A Fragile Thing (any race, 20s-30s)
Words cannot express
consciousness.
I remember my memory,
still it gets a little hazy.
Especially now?
Especially now.
My existence is taking its toll on me.
Everything takes more effort
making decisions takes more effort
going outside takes more effort
seeing people takes more effort
not seeing people takes more effort
I just
want
to sleep.
I could teach you how to sleep...
I’m not saying you need me to,
I’m just saying I could,
if you wanted to,
if you ever got tired,
if you needed an escape.
Just if
that ever happened…
I could teach you how to sleep.
Who are you? I remember my memory,
still it gets a little hazy.
I’m just trying to sleep.
Everything takes more effort.
I could… I could teach you how to sleep?
Everything… takes more effort…. these days.
Going outside takes more effort….
Parts of Me, Parts of You from LOVE/Language (any race, 20s+)
I’m not sure what is gained and what is lost by borrowing, receiving, taking these small pieces but leaving the whole - knowing I may never meet their owners again, may never meet some of them at all.
But I do know
sometimes being me is like being bits of twenty people,
or more -
a hundred,
a thousand -
and these souvenirs are proof of that.
I am trying to build who I am, to discover me, through them.
I know no other way to love myself.
Get Ready With Me from COVID Monologues (any race, late teens - early 20s)
I just… I wish I had someone to…
I don’t know
i guess…
i mean… i‘ve started wondering…
like
what’s my life gonna be like in five years?
how much time have i Actually lost during this?
i just wish i knew how to handle all of it
like how do people uh
you know
how
?
The Shoes (any race, 20s+)
The first time I polished my light brown derby oxfords, I nicked my finger on the polish tin. Nothing bad, a drop of blood similar to a pin prick or paper cut. I ignored it and continued gathering polish on the cloth. I’d never used polish before and the smell reminded me of being a kid on
saturday night, my father preps
a sermon, a suit, and his shoes.
He opens a small can of polish,
swipes some up with an overused
rag, and begins to carefully care
for his leather shoes,
a gift from someone dear to him.
these are the brown shoes,
to match a lighter suit, because,
I realize now, it is Easter.
My father mumbles the
sermon as he works.
Jesus says
“take this cup from me”
to his father.
He is scared and begging,
not very god-like,
not even prophet-like,
just human, I guess.
My father methodically
rubs small circles around
the toe,
the side,
the heel,
the other side.
His church doesn’t have the rituals of,
say, Catholicism
but my father makes his own.
Religious or not,
sometimes it feels important to let these things carry forward.
So I methodically rubbed small circles around the toe, the side, the heel, the other side. And as I did I thought of the Easter sermon, and the conversation I wanted to have with him, a conversation we’ll never have.