Krapp's Last Tape & Embers

Perhaps my best years are gone. When there was a chance of happiness. But I wouldn't want them back. Not with the fire in me now. No, I wouldn't want them back.

I lay down across her with my face in her breasts and my hand on her. We lay there without moving. But under us all moved, and moved us, gently, up and down, and from side to side. (Pause. Krapp's lips move. No sound.) Past midnight. Never knew such silence. The earth might be uninhabited.

How do you manage it, she said, at your age? I told her I'd been saving up for her all my life.

Be again, be again. (Pause.) All that old misery. (Pause.) Once wasn't enough for you.

I asked her to look at me and after a few moments - (pause) - after a few moments she did, but the eyes just slits, because of the glare I bent over her to get them in the shadow and they opened. (Pause. Low) Let me in.

The new light above my table is a great improvement. With all this darkness around me I feel less alone. (Pause.) In a way. (Pause.) I love to get up and move about in it, then back here to... (hesitates) ...me. (Pause.)

I happened to look up and there it was. All over and done with, at last. I sat on for a few moments with the ball in my hand and the dog yelping and pawing at me. (Pause.) Moments. Her moments, my moments (Pause.) The dog's moments.

White world, great trouble, not a sound, only the embers, sound of dying, dying glow

With all this darkness round me I feel less alone. In a way. I love to get up and move about in it, then back here to . . . me.