a short play about grief by Andra Laine Hunter This play is protected by copyright. To request a performance license, please contact andralainehunterplaywright@gmail.com. Characters Roles open to any race/ethnicity and gender identification. Setting Note Synopsis Setting: The playing space represents a beautiful place in nature that is special and important to ERIN and HANK. I picture a high, bright, breezy place. It doesn’t need to be indicated by anything physical at all. At rise: Lights rise on the sounds of this place. A peacefulness pervades. After a few beats, we hear ERIN and HANK. This spot has not been easy to reach. HANK, especially, is out of breath. They enter. HANK has a potted peach tree strapped to his back. ERIN carries a shovel. Oh! Wow, it’s… gives her a look. Do you know how heavy water is? Beat. Well, should we dig first or say a few words? Dad loved stories. (ERIN gives HANK a look.) Beat. HANK And the wind picks up and blows, and clouds dance across the sun, and, for them, it is the most beautiful song that was ever sung. ERIN readies the shovel for digging. The lights fade very quickly to black as the following dialogue occurs. Lights have faded to black. Sound of shovel breaking dirt. Sound of gentle thunder and then rain falling. End of play. ABOUT THE AUTHOR Andra Laine Hunter is a playwright and theatre artist living in Dallas, Texas. She is the Founder and Artistic Director of The Linden Grove Theatre Company, and her plays have been performed around the U.S. She holds a BFA from Southern Methodist University and a MFA from Spalding University. Her play The Abbey of the Holy Lonesome will come out in podcast form in April with The Garden of Voices and will be produced by The Lab Theatre Project of Ybor City, Florida in October of 2022.
Gravepeach
Erin, early 20s, Hank’s sister.
Hank, early 20s, Erin’s brother.
A beautiful, remote natural place that is important to Erin and Hank because it was important to their father.
Erin and Hank are always sincere in their search for the real goodbye.
Hank and Erin must say goodbye to their father…but in the midst of grief and loss, can they find a way to say what’s in their hearts? GravePeach is a play about the rituals we employ around the liminal space of loss and the ways we can find to say the real goodbye.
You said it’s—
You’ve been here as many times as—
Well, we’re almost there.
Do you want me to carry the peach tree?
Hank, come on. Just let me take it.
For god’s sake, I’m just as capable of carrying—
I want to do it for him, Erin.
He never wimped out on anything, ever in his life, so I can’t wimp out now.
You said we’re almost—
Yeah.
See?
Remember?
Somehow I forgot how beautiful…
I know.
I think that’s why he always brought us back.
It’s like your brain can’t hold how beautiful it is, and so you have to come back to remind yourself.
He would’ve…
Yeah. This is right.
You were right. This is the place to…
I just wish we could have brought…
Well, I couldn’t have carried him up here.
I was going to say his ashes.
His…ashes.
He wanted to be part of nature.
He wanted to feed a peach tree. Grow peaches for…
I couldn’t eat peaches from his ashes, though? Could you?
I don’t know.
No.
No, I don’t think so. Probably not.
But we don’t have his ashes, anyway; he’s in a mass—.
So, just regular dirt will have to feed his peach tree…
And sunlight.
And rain.
Wait. Where’s the water? I thought you were bringing water.
Dammit, you said—
Well…
I checked the forecast, and it’s supposed to rain. Tomorrow.
Water is way heavier than a tree.
The tree needs water, Erin.
What are we even doing this for if we don’t water the tree?
It just…
I’m…you know, it’s…I mean…
You’re right.
I don’t leave until day after tomorrow. I can hike back up tomorrow. With water. Okay?
Fine.
That’s fine.
I’m sorry.
I shouldn’t have brought it up.
We should just be in this moment.
No. You’re right. The tree’s gotta have water. I’m sorry.
He loved to talk. He was the storyteller.
I know. But it feels wrong just to put the tree in the dirt and leave without even…
Watering it?
I don’t know. Maybe we should say a prayer?
A prayer?
Wait, you think we should pray?
It’s customary, at a funeral, to pray.
I don’t know how to pray.
Neither do I.
Well, neither do I.
Okay.
Is this dad’s funeral?
Well, they said they’d open the.You know the
(ERIN nods), mass grave, eventually.
And then we can cremate him and have a real funeral, with ashes, I guess.
And someone who knows how to pray.
Right.
But we have to say something for him now. We can’t just not say anything.
Alright. Let me think…
Tell a story.
Okay…um….
Um….
Once there was man. There was a man whose heart was…full of love. And he…he always thought he should have been a farmer—
But he was a doctor.
Yes, he was a doctor who wanted to be a farmer.
Because he wanted to nourish the lives of others—
Which he did—
Which he did, just not with food.
He nourished them with his hands and with his knowledge.
And with his heart.
Because his heart was big and full of love.
And his mind was full of knowledge of so many ways a person could be sick.
And all the ways a doctor could cure them.
But sometimes there’s ways to get sick that people don’t know about. New ways.
And even the best doctors might not be able to learn or figure out—
Research—
—fast enough to save everyone.
And I think this man, this doctor who wanted to be a farmer, he gave some of his heart to all his patients, to save them. And the ones he couldn’t save, he gave some of his heart to, too, because he was so sad that he couldn’t save them. Until one day when he started to get sick. And he got sicker and sicker and…he realized he’d given too much of his heart away.
All the love he’d given away…his heart couldn’t…he died.
He died.
And his children didn’t get to hold his hand or give him any of their hearts. Or say goodbye.
And all they could do was bring a peach tree to his favorite spot to plant it and hope that it would nourish someone or something in a way he couldn’t anymore.
But in the very way he’d always wanted to.
And the peach tree grew big—
And it made beautiful pink blossoms in spring.
And fat, juicy peaches in summer that squirrels and birds and animals would eat.
And one day, his children hiked back up to the place, and they saw the tree, and they were overcome by how big and strong and beautiful it was.
And they felt…they felt…
What did they feel?
I don’t know. I don’t…
I can’t think of any way that we might feel, because the tree couldn’t replace Dad, of course it couldn’t. It was a beautiful tree, but it couldn’t talk to us or give us advice or do anything but stand there and grow.
It could make peaches.
Again, that’s not a substitute for—
I know! We have to think, though. We have to think of how we felt. Um… The tree was always reaching up. And the way it reached up reminded them to reach up.
Okay…
The way the tree reached up for the sky was like a prayer. And the children realized the tree was whispering its prayer, always, all the time, from the sun coming up, to the moon going down, and all they had to do was listen, really, really close, and they would hear the tree’s prayer.
So they listened.
And the tree’s prayer went like: … it went:…
Spirits and Souls that watch over the Earth and the People: I love you. I bring my Pink Blossoms and my Delicious Peaches to the Altar of your Heart—of Everyone’s Heart who sees me, and listens to me standing here, reaching up, praying.
My Branches hold the Bees and Butterflies, but they also hold the Love of a Father for his Children.
This is my Promise: If you watch me long enough, you’ll learn to reach up, and you’ll learn how to pray, too. Amen.
Amen. That was nice, Erin.
Dad would have really liked that.
Is this…Hank, is this the…
I mean…
Will we come back here? I mean, after I water the tree tomorrow, will we…?
Sure we will.
Of course. Why would we not…?
I’m afraid we won’t come back.
Maybe we won’t be able to get back.
What if we forget the way?
How could you forget now?
I mean, what if we come back and the peach tree is dead—Hank, or—
Or chopped down or something!? Or broken! What if it breaks?!
Oh, god. Lightning could strike it. Or a bulldozer could come.
Or a hungry bear might try to climb it to eat peaches and break it, and it could die.
The tree could die, Hank! I don’t think I could lose him again.
I can’t. I can’t lose him again, Hank, I can’t.
The tree just has to live, it has to grow and, and…
Flourish.
Nourish.
Yeah.
Yeah.
But I mean, if we come back here, and it’s dead or broken or…
I mean, is this, planting this…Is this goodbye?
I don’t know. Maybe. Isn’t it always goodbye? Only you don’t know it’s the real goodbye until you realize one day you’ve never gone back. And if you realize that at a time when you can’t go back, then…
Then that last time, whenever it was, was goodbye.
I think that’s right.
The last time, whenever it is, is goodbye.
I think we plant it, Erin.
And you water it tomorrow.
And we just have to remember, because if we came back and the tree wasn’t flourishing, then…
We’d be losing him all over again, and we couldn’t…We’re too scared to know we’ve lost him again.
So, we remember him growing here, reaching up—
But it’s not him.
It’s only the tree.
He’s with…all those other people in the big grave of all—
Let’s focus on the tree now, okay?
Let’s focus on the memory we want to have in case this is the real goodbye. See it. Tell me you can see it, okay?
He’ll be up here, under the sky.
And the rain will fall.
And the wind will blow. And the sun will shine.
And the moon will shine.
And fall. Stars will shine, and they’ll fall.
Right. And the roots will go deeper and deeper.
And the branches will lift higher and higher.
And bees will come to the flowers.
And birds and animals will come to eat the peaches.
And maybe people.
Hikers.
He’ll nourish people.
And that’s what he wanted, right? Can you see it?
Yeah. Yeah, I can see it.
I think this is goodbye, Erin.
I think, even if we do come back, that now, right now, is the real goodbye.
This is leaving him to…
Let’s…
Are you ready to plant the…?
(HANK reaches for the shovel.)
No! I’m not! I’m not ready, Hank! How am I supposed to be ready?
We…just have to be.
I think we have to sing a song. Don’t people sing songs sometimes at funerals?
Yeah, they do. What song should we sing?
Um….
Can you think of a song?
Um…
Fluorish, tree
Nourish, tree
Grow and reach up.
Pray and tell stories and
…Never give up
Flourish, tree
Nourish, tree
Grow and reach up.
Pray and tell stories and
He sings the last line alone.
…Remember our love.
Goodbye, Dad.
Goodbye, Dad.
We love you.
We love you, Dad.
Okay, Hank. I’m ready.
Let’s dig.
Let’s dig.
Dig.
Dig…
