20070501

performance text (English)

I am the professor, head physician, tried-out empirist.
You are my students.
We are beneath the gigantic leaves of the Todeng plant.
The professor opens his arms: First I will dance the circular Todeng waltz.

Look how I step with one leg after another in the moonlight.
Look I rock in a three-beat rhythm, softly swaying like a ship on the large breasts of the sea.

If the professor fell down now, he could receive second-degree burns due to the toxic substances in the ground.
The acids eat their way deep into the organic tissue.

The students observe him in the moonlight.
Dear colleagues!
Under the gigantic Todeng leaves they lower their heads, dig in the toxic earth with mobile toes and start humming.
As an old empiricist I’d like to here invite you to witness a unique experiment. Please arrange yourselves in a semicircle.
The professor leans his upper body forward and bends his knees.
His head touches the rhinoceros-skin-like surface of a Todeng leaf.
The plants draw elongated shadows on him.
The professor’s legs are red.
The student’s legs are golden.

The students stand in a semi-circle and sing:
They come in all colours and forms. And they are simply wonderful to walk with!
They are lighter than our former organic legs.
We have a graceful, elegant gait.
The mobility of the knee joint is amazing and the spring-function of the ankle is pleasing.
We can jump very high if we want to.

Everybody is wearing integration prostheses. Professors, students, patients…

Nowadays everybody has their prosthesis screwed directly into the femur bone after the amputation of their legs.
Research is so developed that the mass production of the necessary, specific, multi-utile permanent material presents no problem.
Only 2% of cases show complications in the binding of organic and artificial material.

Everybody is wearing integration prostheses. Professors, students, patients…

The professor stands underneath an enormous Todeng leaf.
Please, stop singing and look at me!
He opens his arms.
Dear collegues! Now I will dance the circular todengwaltz.
The professor bends his upper body forward and bends his knees.
His head touches the giant todeng leaf.
His white doctors smock is folded on his back.
His testicles peak out and receive the moonlight.
Look how I step with one leg after another.
Look, I rock in a three-beat rhythm, softly swing like a ship on the large breasts of the sea. Observe how I approach the rhythm of the plants.
Observe my red feet.

It has become routine to sever the two jeopardized and ultimately dangerous limbs as soon as the person is fully grown.
This procedure spares many from becoming witnesses to the painful, gradual death of their legs.
Integration prosthesis are screwed directly into the femur bone.
Only 2% of cases present complications in the binding of organic and artificial material.
They come in all colours and forms.
They are lighter than organic legs.

The professor dances the Todeng waltz in his doctor’s smock and face guard over his mouth.
He rocks in a three-beat rhythm.
While the professor slowly turns underneath the giant Todeng leaves all his students can get a good look at the make-up, size and form of the two hanging balls.
As you know — the professor exclaims while dancing — in the last twenty years an increasing number of Todeng forests have been planted in Europe.
One of the most noteworthy characteristics of these plants is that they can filter nourishment out of highly toxic soil.

The leaves of the Todeng are gigantic.
Softly they sway up and down, moved by the wind of the night.
While millions of root ends, as fine as hair, suck eagerly from the toxic earth the rest of the life sustaining feeding-systems of the plant are pushing towards the moonlight.
The nutrients have to go through a complicated filtering process -requiring the moonlight- before they dissipate into the periphery of the leaves.

Dear collegues! As an old empirist I want to invite you here and now, to become witnesses to this nightly experiment.
The students stand waiting around their professor.
But first - he opens his arms - I will dance the circular todengwaltz.
Again? The students look at each other.
When does the experiment actually start?
Don’t be so cryptic, professor!
The professor starts to dance again.
Oh, I can already feel the first sprouting! he calls out and turns around his axes.
His testicles touch a large cylindrical hermaphrodite flower.
It spins and turns in me, touches here my intestine, there gently my liver. Soon pure life will emerge out of me!
The students frown. What’s that supposed to mean?
And what does your interesting demonstration have to do with the Todeng plants?

The professor breathes spasmodically.
Look how I approach the rhythm of the plants.
See how I melt into this forest and the jungle of your presence.
See how the high, reaching Todeng branches begin to shake with me.
Observe my red feet.
Observe my nipples, these buds of hope. Your witnessing…ach, I’m getting dizzy.
The students get nervous.
Dear colleague, don’t you think that you might be a victim of a plant-induced false pregnancy?
Please, let us not mistake a scientific experiment with a trick!

The professor turns faster and faster.
He breathes spasmodically, his mouth foaming.
He tears the doctors suit from his body.
His hips are vibrating.
Suddenly he throws up his trembling arms and throws his head back.
Fountains of milky fluid shoot out of his breast.
White flashes move through the professor’s eyes and his legs begin to glow.
The roots and stems of the Todeng plants surrounding him glow.
The ground around the professor glows.
He students take a few steps back.
The professor turns faster and faster.
His integration-prostheses do not melt.

Help, the professor threatens to fall!"

If the professor now in his trance-like state fell down, he could get second-degree burns from the toxic substances in the ground.

The glowing of the earth fades away.
The professor cannot steer the movements of his legs anymore!
He is skidding.
His prostheses!
The students plunge towards their professor.
While falling he can only just grab a Todeng branch.
One look towards his legs delivers evidence.
His integration prostheses are losing their grip in the femur bone!

The professor hauls himself onto the Todeng branch and hangs now head-over-toe in the moonlight.
He can feel the soft thorns of the branch press against his belly.
Professor! The students all shout out at once.
Some of them want take him off the Todeng plant, to get him quickly out of the forest.
Get off me! Don’t you see? Soon pure life will emerge out of me!
Tears of joy run down the professor’s cheeks.
Soon my dear Todeng children will connect me with the earth!
Don’t you see how they crane their necks, how they push the prostheses out of the bone.
And really, his integration prostheses slowly unscrew from the femur bone as if moved by an inner hand.
Finally the integration prostheses come off and fall with a muffled sound to the ground.
They roll under a huge Todeng leaf.
Out of his leg stumps blood streams.

Dear colleagues! The professor opens his arms in this hanging position.
His fingertips almost touch the toxic ground.
Become witnesses to the first Todeng-birth!
Stay with me to assist this wonderful event.
The students calm and collected step closer with interest.
They are amazed by the sight of these fine root-like Todeng sprouts and by how they find their way out of the Professor’s leg stumps.
Through even breathing I will speed up the process and encourage the sprouts to find their way out.
My beloved Todeng children will grow fast.
And who knows how high I will finally float amidst the crones of the Todeng trees, to swing in the wind with them.