This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:00] Unknown speaker: Next up on Destination Freedom.

[0:02] Unknown speaker: Even if the white crystals fall from the sky and sparkle on withering trees, I'll just pull from my roots and get all the joy I need to get me through.

[0:13] Unknown speaker: Eve takes Songbird's body and rests it over by the tree.

[0:17] Unknown speaker: She goes and grabs a bowl filled with water and a cloth.

[0:21] Unknown speaker: She wets the cloth and puts it on Songbird's lips.

[0:26] Unknown speaker: A few moments later, Songbird becomes conscious.

[0:44] Unknown speaker: Welcome to Destination Freedom Black Radio Days Podcast, a copyrighted program of No Credits Productions LLC.

[0:50] Unknown speaker: Our producer director, Danielle Betts.

[0:54] Unknown speaker: Next up, Round Solstice by Nadia Jackson.

[0:58] Unknown speaker: Round Solstice was inspired by the compilation of poems that the playwright wrote referencing the relationship humans have with nature.

[1:05] Unknown speaker: Over time it became an experimental play that was adapted from those poems, where she explored the potential consequences of climate change in a more abstract way.

[1:15] Unknown speaker: Coming up next on Destination Freedom, Round Solstice.

[1:29] Unknown speaker: A young ethereal woman sitting down beneath the trapeze that appears as a tree, indulging in some fruit.

[1:36] Unknown speaker: As you imagine this story, envision a restless forest with trapezes camouflaged as trees spread amongst the space.

[1:46] Unknown speaker: Rubin enters and slowly climbs one of the trapezes and swings behind a tree and startles Eve.

[1:54] Rubin: Don't creep on me like that.

[1:56] Eve: Oh, my dad.

[1:58] Rubin: I didn't mean to startle you. I was just playing around.

[2:03] Unknown speaker: Rubin and Eve engage in special contact that is special and clairvoyant to them.

[2:13] Rubin: You want some fruit?

[2:13] Eve: What you pick today?

[2:14] Rubin: Mangoes.

[2:17] Eve: Mangos.

[2:18] Rubin: You ain't got no apples in that bag of yours.

[2:21] Eve: Not today, Rubin. You know I can provide them next time if that's what you like.

[2:27] Unknown speaker: Eve hands Rubin a mango and gives him a smile with an impressive eye roll.

[2:32] Unknown speaker: They both chuckle.

[2:34] Unknown speaker: They sit in silence for a while and eat their mangoes.

[2:39] Eve: They're shooting birds and burning trees again.

[2:42] Rubin: Just the other day I saw a bird fall from a tree.

[2:57] Unknown speaker: The birds are beginning to flee.

[2:59] Unknown speaker: They flop together and fly away to a place where they can finally be free.

[3:04] Unknown speaker: The leaves will begin to fall and turn into darker hues, and there will be less smoking trees.

[3:12] Unknown speaker: Eve begins to pack her belongings with a sense of urgency.

[3:16] Eve: So the fire has spread?

[3:17] Rubin: I saw them moving their way to the mountains.

[3:20] Eve: Which way is the fire spreading?

[3:23] Rubin: Flames rise and spread.

[3:25] Rubin: The big blow up was West, you know.

[3:28] Rubin: The season has come and chaos is dancing like tornadoes, and here we are, right in the middle.

[3:35] Eve: We must prepare to shed our skins like the snake that slits it in the wheat grass at dawn.

[3:40] Eve: When nights grow colder and the sun diminishes itself earlier, what will you think of?

[3:48] Unknown speaker: There is a shift that breaks the fourth wall.

[3:52] Unknown speaker: Eve and Rubin move away from each other and are now immersed in their own worlds.

[3:57] Unknown speaker: They are asymmetrical from each other, no longer aware of each other's presence.

[4:03] Unknown speaker: Songbird singing a song of her own, and no one can sing along.

[4:08] Unknown speaker: She stops and talks to strangers and walks with newfound friends.

[4:14] Unknown speaker: Songbird walks up to Rubin, who is squatting down, trying to open a pomegranate.

[4:19] Songbird: See, you got some of them exotic fruits.

[4:22] Songbird: I know who one who goes out picking from trees.

[4:25] Songbird: She gives them to me as gifts.

[4:28] Rubin: So, how are you gonna eat it?

[4:30] Songbird: I don't know. She handed it to me while she was on our way.

[4:33] Rubin: You better find somebody to open that thing and save some for me to nibble on.

[4:46] Songbird: It was night, and I saw my daddy.

[4:49] Songbird: Where the flames grew all around him, where his body shed ashes on the ground.

[4:54] Songbird: When I rest my hair today, those memories are stuck on replay.

[5:04] Unknown speaker: Songbird falls.

[5:06] Songbird: Daddy.

[5:08] Songbird: Daddy, come get the bird, Daddy.

[5:12] Songbird: The bird was just resting in the tree, and that was a big bang noise, and he fell.

[5:18] Songbird: Daddy, Daddy, where are you?

[5:26] Unknown speaker: Feeling young again, even though time is not reversing, and right now, I ain't thinking about the past.

[5:33] Unknown speaker: I planted my seed, and my roots are making their way deep into the ground.

[5:38] Unknown speaker: Even if the white crystals fall from the sky and sparkle on withering trees, I'll just pull from my roots and get all the joy I need to get me through.

[5:50] Unknown speaker: Eve takes Songbird's body and rests it over by the tree.

[5:54] Unknown speaker: She goes and grabs a bowl filled with water and a cloth.

[5:58] Unknown speaker: She wets the cloth and puts it on Songbird's lips.

[6:02] Unknown speaker: A few moments later, Songbird becomes conscious.

[6:20] Unknown speaker: They could have killed Songbird.

[6:22] Unknown speaker: They only clipped its wings.

[6:24] Unknown speaker: They could come back and trap her.

[6:26] Eve: Why do we go?

[6:28] Eve: This is all I know.

[6:29] Eve: This is home.

[6:30] Rubin: You may never get the chance to see the full moon from your bedroom window.

[6:35] Rubin: Eve, you're very swift when it comes to moving forward.

[6:38] Rubin: If we leave and settle in a place where we're still not welcome, and they are still striking trees with flames of fire and letting corpses compost into the fallen leaves, what would we do then?

[6:49] Eve: We can't keep running, Eve.

[6:51] Eve: I don't want to leave without you.

[6:54] Eve: We cannot go through this alone, and we don't have to either.

[6:58] Eve: If they come and strike again, I will migrate in between seasons with you, test the waters with you, move mountains along with you, and risk it all and then die with you.

[7:09] Eve: Come back next season, and butterflies are released from my stomach when I look at you.

[7:16] Eve: Because we found one another again in the city of angels, and we reminisced how we flocked together, prayed to the sky above, and we got it together.

[7:25] Eve: We are no longer tainted by the dreadful winter weather.

[7:29] Eve: Dragonflies and butterflies are always passing me by.

[7:34] Eve: That's when I remember I am alive.

[7:38] Eve: I can hear the trumpets from above and say to myself, damn, I am alive.

[7:47] Eve: I am not at peace here.

[7:50] Eve: Grateful for that butterfly that flew by.

[7:53] Eve: And yes, I know how it feels to flutter through the wind and past the lilies.

[8:00] Eve: But for a moment, I would like just drift and float.

[8:04] Eve: Float.

[8:06] Eve: The rock above the tides.

[8:09] Eve: I'm sure there is one perfectly made for me specifically in the Pacific.

[8:14] Eve: Give me a moment for my body to walk the long ways.

[8:31] Unknown speaker: They become in tune and play for a while.

[8:35] Unknown speaker: Aggressive yelling and sounds of explosion come intense.

[8:39] Unknown speaker: And suddenly, Songbird falls to the ground and the music stops.

[8:43] Unknown speaker: We go to the Pacific to be specific.

[8:46] Eve: Why, yes, there is a drought and danger here.

[8:50] Eve: But if we stay, Rubin, please, we must go.

[8:54] Eve: What is anchoring you here?

[8:56] Unknown speaker: Rubin gets struck and falls beside Songbird.

[9:01] Unknown speaker: There is silence.

[9:03] Unknown speaker: Eve is still for a moment, perturbed by what had occurred.

[9:08] Eve: Can you tell me if I'm alive?

[9:10] Eve: When am I feeling weary?

[9:12] Eve: I'm alive, but my body has carried my soul to sleep.

[9:16] Eve: I've seen spirits leave bodies and dance at night and linger on with the stars.

[9:22] Eve: When the bird sings again, I will think of how you and I fought to be amongst the songbirds in the trees, how we picked our apples, laid our cooked fish on leaves, and watched all the colors blend in the sky.

[9:36] Eve: When we are removed from our homes, trees are being slashed, and my lungs are breathing in toxic fumes.

[9:44] Eve: That is when I give myself over to perish with earth.

[9:48] Eve: Maybe in a new life, the waters, forests, and creatures will be protected and not destroyed for selfish consumption.

[9:58] Eve: Try to burn down morals like a building and challenge laws of mankind.

[10:03] Eve: When will you transform?

[10:06] Eve: Blood boiling and rushing through my veins, waiting to awaken Earth from its core and challenge mortality.

[10:13] Eve: One we fear most.

[10:15] Eve: When will we reform?

[10:17] Eve: Locked will in freedom and cages and let it deteriorate.

[10:21] Eve: You and I could forget about the days when the sun kissed our wings and it felt like home.

[10:27] Eve: Feet stayed planted, so they won't make a sound.

[10:30] Eve: The urge to run free made us drown.

[10:34] Eve: However, like everything else, we come back around, holding hands, willing to give life on earth another chance to be restored and whole.

[10:53] Unknown speaker: You've just heard Destination Freedom's Round Solstice by Nadia Jackson.

[10:58] Unknown speaker: Produced and directed by Danielle Betts, co-produced and mixed by Maurice A.K.A. Reese Smith.

[11:04] Unknown speaker: This series is made possible in part with the support of The Urban Spectrum, Bonfield Stanford Foundation, the ULPI Fund of the Denver Foundation, KGNU Community Radio, and No Credits Productions LLC.

[11:18] Unknown speaker: Listen, download, like, and comment at BroadwayPodcastNetwork.com.

[11:23] Unknown speaker: Be free.

[11:26] Unknown speaker: Thank you for listening.