"Ephemeral Publications"

Night. Artists crowded together at drawing tables and desks, even working on the floor, at the Ephemeral Publications comics office.

A typewriter clatters while a clock ticks loudly. Izzy, cigar in mouth, is typing a page of comics with one finger (projected as he types in panel 1). The cartoonists, in visors and vests, are hunched over drawing tables working feverishly.

A page of comics is being ruled out and lettered in panel 2 as soon as it's described, and penciled and inked by several pairs of hands simultaneously in close-up in panel 3.

TODD:

It's kinda fun . . .
figuring out the angles, the page layouts . . .
the timing.
    (everything goes silent and freezes)

It's a whole new way of telling stories—and not just a few panels a day like the newspaper strips. It's almost like movies, but you get to be everybody from cameraman to (fluttering his lashes) leading lady.

WOOZY:

Yeah, but we got a scriptwriter who's brain-dead.
Lookit this Triumphant Trio story we're doin: Red,
White and Bloozy smash their way out of Dachau,
fly to Hitler's headquarters in a rocket ship and beat
up the Gestapo guards all in one page. Then Red
blasts Hitler into a swastika-shaped pile of ashes with
his laser gun and snarls "This is for trying to destroy
Democracy, you despicable dictator!"

Jeezis. Izzy. How kin you write such total drivel? [Begin Page 13]

Todd wanders the street, musing, and slips on some dog shit. He sees (a projected drawing of) what looks to be a very, very long dachshund behind two trees and a fire hydrant. As they finish doing their duty and walk past he sees it was actually 3 dogs. A lightbulb slowly begins to glow above Todd's head:

A rubber pup.

(The dachshund loops across the width of the stage and turns into the Rubber Pup)

YUP! A rubber pup!
He kin scrunch himself down
or stretch himself up.
A mutt who kin morph into any old thing:
a lamp,
or a chair,
or a creaky old swing!
A bird,
Or a bra with a triple-D cup.
Better look out, cats . . .
It's the bouncing Rubber Pup! [Begin Page 16]

They meet at the elevator. Romantic music wells up louder and painfully louder.

WOOZY:

Nice gams.

VI:

Love at first sight.

It was fate.

WOOZY:

Nice night.
Nice gams.
Let's mate.

VI (glancing, straightening her stocking):

Flatterer!

Thought balloons above Vi's head include covers of romance and confession magazines; thought balloons above Woozy's head are from Tijuana Bibles. [Begin Page 20]

TODD:

Whatcha doin, Woozy?

WOOZY (straightening up):

Oh, nothin' much, but . . .
y'see . . .

I'm a tough galoot,
a kinda dissolute
lady splatterer.
You may find it appalling,
But I consider it a calling:
I'm a batterer!

CHORUS OF PASSING WIMMEN:

He's a batterer . . .

WOOZY:

Y'know, violence runs in families, they say,
so you'd think females nearing me would run away;
but I shower them with flattery,
followed by assault 'n' battery.
I'm like Bluto in some Popeye cartoon.
I'll launch a miss like a missile to the moon.
I'm a big bad bruiser,
a substance abuser,
I'm a winning little loser:
I'm a batterer.

Epilogue

Time does not stay
and its travels are relentlessly one way
I can tell you with sorrow,
that it keeps moving toward tomorrow
and never seems to head toward yesterday.

Toward death the die is cast
and (though it might be a blast)
you cannot change the past.
On the other hand . . .

you CAN see
the first as last
in COMICS,
when you
read the other
way.

Turning time into space
provides the saving grace
of putting another face
on reality
as it sputters sickly by.
You can move around a page
to undo your old age
it's easy and it's easy on the eye...