Tenor: | Dogman |
Soprano: | Seagulls, various |
Basso Profundo: | The Seal |
Chorus: | Beach bums |
The Band: | Banjofish, Harmonicafish, Washboardfish, Jugfish |
Act 1, Scene 1: | Dogman, walking the beach. |
He contemplates, life, death, and hotdogs. |
Dogman: | This hotdog sings the mustard, sings the relish, relish the sky, relish the beach, my tongue in a pickle all day la la. |
Beach Bums: | Yes! Yes! Sing with relish! |
Dogman: | Sing with abandon! But abandon means bereft. I sing and am alone forever, my lungs lost in a forest of breath. |
Beach Bums: | No! No! He must not be lost! |
Dogman: | Like Popeye I smoke the spinach of storms. I flex my blimps. |
The Seal: | (Burps). |
Dogman: | A great fishyness fills the air… |
Seagull: | Yessiree yamma yamma fishfishfish. |
The Seal: | God said let there be squid, and there was squid. |
Seagull: | Yamma yamma squidsquidsquid. |
Dogman: | Clams are an open book of wagging tongues, shoal-mamas. I attend death at their pearly gates. |
(Clam harmonica plays…) | |
Dogman: | I see the angry red kimono of sky open, naked sun flashing the sea. |
Beach Bums: | What do you see, oh what do you see? |
Dogman: | I see ramshackle clamshackle clamtastic fantastic hallelujah. |
The Sea Hag tosses my fate like dice eyes. | |
Snakes in the house of Fate, spots scratched out, rolling blind. | |
Seagull: | Yamma yamma |
Dogman: | The sky’s white lei’s of lightning, welcome to stormwash. |
Flowers of heathen dance shock my neck. | |
My Popeye’s sailor pants are salted and scrimmed and scrummed. | |
Beach Bums: | “O Fortuna velut luna statu variabilis, semper crescis aut decrescis”* |
Dogman: | Oh monsterous fate! Whirling wheel, malevolent and vain. |
(Clam harmonica, repeat) | |
Dogman: | Is there no shelter from this sky? Is there no hotdog for those shriven of sin? |
Seagull: | Yamma hotdoghotdog. Absolution and Cheez-its! |
Dogman: | Fortune, speak plainly now. I beseech you! |
(Thunder rolls in the distance) | |
Dogman: | Lo! I have had a vision! I abandon this hotdog to the gulls. I craven crave crave but a Mermaid taco! This shall fulfill me at last. To feast on a Chimera! |
Seagulls: (unison) | Skree! Skree! |
Act 1, Scene 2 | A simple cottage near the shore. |
A mermaid hangs wash on the line | |
She, struggles to remain upright… |
*"O Fortune, like the moon you are changeable, ever waxing ever waning" -- Carmina Burana