The play is set in the not
very distant future
when the world’s bee
population has been decimated
by disease, neglect and greed
(which, after all, are the same thing).
The memory of the bee in the recently buzz-free world is now
enshrined—if at all—within the world of art and design.
But so much weepy, impure
nostalgia for the bee has now somehow animated enough failing bee-energy to
have resulted in the mysterious appearance of one gigantic Final Bee—as big as
an airliner but as empty and diaphanous as a cloud.
So insubstantial is this
chimera-like Final Bee that, huge as it is, some people can see it and some
cannot. It is often thought that
to be able to see the Bee is the privilege—and punishment—of those who bear the
most responsibility for demise of bee-culture
Characters—or presences—in
the play:
1) The Final Bee
2) The late fashion designer Alexander McQueen
3) Winnie-the Pooh
Scene: A city street, late-morning.
Pooh: It’s time for a little something, but
the something I like is gone forever.
How dearly I long for a full pot of creamy golden honey!
McQueen (imitating
nostalgia): Don’t we all!
Pooh: How can you say
that? All YOUR bees are dead! They’re made of gold and silver and you
find them in the meadow of a model’s throat, or studded on a choker around her
pipestem neck.
McQueen: The bee is better
off as art than as hopeless hunger!
There is a faint rustling in
the sky. Both Winnie-the-Pooh and
Alexander McQueen look up, only to find themselves staring at a floating
gigantic bee, as big as a cruise ship but imprecise with emptiness. The behemothic creature is
simultaneously menacing and poignant.
Final Bee (speaking in an
ear-shattering voice that is still, oddly, no more than a whisper): Why do you both want what you want when
your desires are so different? Do
you not see that it’s too late for you both?
Pooh and McQueen: But we LOVE you in our way!!
Final Bee: You cannot. I am a sweet cloud of unknowing. You never knew anything about
Beeworld. You thought it was
(looking at Pooh) free confection, or (looking at Alexander McQueen) easy décor. In fact, it was an adjacent planet of brilliant
aliens who were small and who lived among you.
McQueen: What are you?
Final Bee: I am an angel and an airship.
Pooh: What is your mission?
Final Bee: I am transporting a billion bee-souls
to another planet, a planet
called Honeydorado that once, the domain only of cows, ran copiously with rivers
of milk, but which, shortly, when the bees are revived, will gush with adjacent
well-springs of honey.
McQueen: Do you need a designer?
Final Bee: You both had your chance. So now you may keep your dead jewelry,
and your childish memories of honey-candy, and forget there ever were bees.
Pooh: Take me with you!!
But the Final Bee was gone.
(curtain)
