I want to explore Cubist theater with the dramatic voice.
Speaking history of the north and west.
Working with form and structure [and voice of course] on the stage.
The piece begins with remembrance of the Indian / European Wars.
The cavalry and missionaries.
The anguish of conversion.
I want the prose poems to morph into plays.
I want the triangular shape of teepees   
possibly shadowed on a white wall for the set—
The square of forts and wagons and sometimes the clouds above them.
I want to compose a cohesive, hybrid form of story for the stage.
 
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The Battle of Yellow House Canyon
March 18, 1877
 
Destroy thou them O God — Psalm 5:10
 
Because the rocks looked like yellow houses the Spaniards
said Casas Amarillas. Because they drove stakes into the
High Plains to find their way across the tableland they said
Llano Estacado. Because Medicine Lodge Treaty gave
Comanche and Apache hunting grounds Black Horse
slaughtered an American buffalo hunter picking off buffalo
until his ammunition ran out. Because the buffalo hunter
was found with his stomach cut open the American buffalo
hunters took revenge. Because it was nearing the end of the
Buffalo Hunters’ War Black Horse raided the hide camp
with Apache and Comanche. Because it was a battle of the
Buffalo Hunters’ War the Spaniards were not there to
name.
 
 
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Waiting
 
When the last of the buffalo on the Southern Plains were
killed. The wind lifted dust from the land as if the whole
earth were migrating. There was a crack of dry thunder in
the distance as if buckshot. Then the terrible
silence. 
 
 
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The Cubist
 
  Thou has smitten the cheekbone.
  Thou hast broken teeth — Psalm 3:7
 
O Lord the feet are running. Lord large as a hay wagon. 
The sheep in the field are balls of onions. Their round
bodies abide. He must be in another house. The horses
chase the road. Between the trees the clouds ousted in the
sky. Lord skewed and triumphant. The stalks are cut. The
stubble hard to cross. On the blue house a white door. The sheep
clumsy Lord if there is delay.
 
 
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Rachel Plummer’s Narrative of Twenty One Months Servitude as a
Prisoner Among the Commanchee Indians
 
Outline for a journal in primitive abstract
Wooden Indian style
 
May 1838 Indians raided the Texas settlement. 
They took Rachel and her son.
She never saw him again. 
She was expecting another child.
She became a slave to the Comanche.
The Indians killed the baby when it was born. 
It was interfering with her work.
Rachel was ransomed by Mexican traders.
Returned to her husband. 
Rachel bore a third child and died shortly after. 
The child died two days later.