MARTIN BLADH & BO I. CAVEFORS / INFORMATION 14 / The Miracle

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The monologue The Miracle (Miraklet) by Bo I. Cavefors is a part of Act One of Martin Bladh’s & Bo I. Cavefors’ Action Francis Bacon. Three Studies for a Crusifixion; a Passion Play in three Acts; dedicated to Francis Bacon.

Actors: Johan Adolphi / Martin Bladh / Bo I. Cavefors / Jacob Ohlin / Mikael Oretoft.
Photographers: Peter Andersson and Lars Bosma.
Music: Martin Bladh and Erik Jarl.
Dvd + cd published in April 2008 by Firework Edition Records.

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Bo I. Cavefors
THE MIRACLE

I will tell you a story. Once upon a time, about two hundred years ago. The story takes place in a little town in north Italy, in Piemonte. In the outskirts of the town there was an old marble tower. There the authorities had placed a leprous man and his sister, who was also a leper. The sister died. The leprous man felt ashamed of his sickness, although the upholders of the law claimed that all shame had been extinct, that no one had anything to be ashamed of anymore. The Leper though about killing himself, but the fear of God’s wrath prevented him. So, by mere chance the Leper was saved from eternal damnation. During the days the leper meditated, admired the roses his sister had planted, enjoyed the beautiful view of the valley and the town in the distance. The only company the Leper enjoyed was during those rare occasions when a traveller stopped by, and from a safe distance, spoke with him.

No, it wasn’t really that bad. A little dog had joined the Leper. Why the dog had sought sanctuary at the Leper’s side no one knows. The leper claimed that it might be because the dog was as ugly as himself. The dog had been thrown out, and had also been rejected by the people, which had terrorised it, harassed it, bad-mouthed and taunt it. But to the Leper the dog was worth its weight in gold. Out of gratitude of the mercy God had showed by giving him the dog, the Leper called him the Miracle. A rather awkward name for such an ugly dog. A mongrel, tangled, limp, dirty. A bastard. A bastard.

But the Miracle was like every other male dog. Sometimes he escaped to the town in the valley. Away from the Leper in his marble tower. What was the Miracle doing there? He did what every other male dog who sought freedom does. He was fucking. Preferably other male dogs. The Miracle lived the same life of transgression which Gombrowicz speaks about in his books, especially in his memoirs. And which the painter Francis Bacon depicts in his religious paintings of men making love. Men making love, but always in the presence of God. The Miracle was hovering between the safety, the meditative stillness, love and gloominess of the Leper in his square shaped tower of white marble, and the wild and swinging sexuality that was practised in the parks and backyards of the town. Some of the town citizens, embittered revolutionaries, became upset, indignant of the Miracle’s freedom, and filled an acclaim of his behaviour to the town council, they wrote long letters to the local newspaper and announced a petition to get the Miracle out of the town. Shouting: get the Miracle out of this town! But the Miracle wasn’t just limp and crippled and a dirty bastard, his hearing wasn’t very good either. So the Miracle stayed in the parks and backyards as long as he dared to before he finally was forced to seek shelter in the Leper’s tower. Later on the aggravated moralists claims that they didn’t want to get rid of the Miracle because he was a dog, but because they were afraid that he was spreading an infection, that the Leper’s disease could spread from the Miracle to the town citizens. But all these explanations were nothing more than excuses. The truth is that their anger was nothing more then pure jealousy directed towards the Miracle’s anarchistic freedom. They said that the Miracle should be ashamed. Ashamed of what?

These moralists had a couple of years earlier like French revolutionaries marched under the banners and craved for liberté, fraternité and l’amour. Now, united together for a mutual attack against the Miracle’s freedom. They paid there respect to the town commandant, who was depending on the citizen’s loyalty and tax revenues. The commandant gave an order that the Miracle should be put to death, to be killed, immediately. A couple of soldiers accompanied by these moralising citizens went up to the Leper’s tower to execute the cruel order. The soldiers ordered the Leper to surrender the Miracle to them. They referred to some section of a law that states: it is forbidden to hide fucking dogs. They could be disease carriers. In the presence of the Leper they fetched a heavy rope around the Miracle’s neck and dragged him along with them. When the soldiers, the lynch-mob and the Miracle passed the gate in the wall that surrounded the white marble tower, the Miracle turns around and looks back at the Leper with helpless, begging eyes. But the Leper doesn’t do anything to help or try to save his friend… The soldiers’ intention was to drown the Miracle in the river that runs through the valley, but the mob were already there when they arrived, the rabble, the bourgeois traitors were already there carrying rocks in their hands and they killed the Miracle with these rocks. The Miracle was stoned to death. The Leper could hear his friend’s cry. But he returned to his cell in the marble tower. His trembling knees could hardly hold him up. He throws himself on the bed. Shed some tears. OK. For the second time this day he betrayed the Miracle. Later on the Leper claims that he, in the order to execute the dog can’t see anything but the cruel moralising and the barbarisms of the authority in charge. But the Leper doesn’t realise, he might not even suspect that the Miracle was only the first victim, and that he himself, the Leper, could be the next victim and then follows victim after victim after victim of deviants who do not fit into the aggravated citizens - in the new moralists and the authorities’ normative hysteria. These dissidents are growing tumours in the body of society. Maybe the fags want to rape the animals, cute little puppets. How do we make action out of words? How do we remove these tumours? Through decapitation or the electric chair, like in Texas? With rat poison? The Leper himself became a victim of this mass hysteria, of this immoral morality which is being preached by newspaper journalists, preachers and neo-Nazis, when he later says that he is ashamed of his sentimentality. Ashamed, ashamed! Ashamed of his sentimentality! Ashamed of the shame of being born…

Translation by Martin Bladh.
Actors on the Photo: Bo I. Cavefors and Johan Adolphi.

Copyright©text:Bo I. Cavefors and Martin Bladh 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008.
Copyright©photographs:Peter Andersson and Lars Bosma 2007, 2008.