DRAMATIC MONOLOGUE Poem: The Robber’s Tale, by Randall Dills

A Dramatic Monologue based on The Musicians of Bremen.

The first I took with trembling hand,
fruit succulent from a tree in
the landlord’s orchard,
tasted it, tasted juice, never
in all my years had I tasted such juice
for was not I too turned out from home?
Sent to the road?
A person of the road made to live
the way of the road.

If it could have been different
I would have done different,
the church, a trade, apprenticed, a carter
anything but the road
but the road it is and living is lean
it’s bone
it’s no honor among thieves
it is one scare, one fright from the shakes
and I can’t go on but I swallow
I take, I steal, I hold you up on the road
in the dark forest and take what is mine
for won’t you be made good
in this life or the next?

There is nothing for me in this life
or next, there is only the road
the darkness
keeping one up on those beside me,
my brother my captor my killer,

the food at our table, a banquets feast
warm, there is beer and for the taste of beer
I will sell my soul to wrap my fingers around a stein
and have it

that is the bit of living I crave in the cold
when I see you coming down the road
with sacks in hand bags over shoulder
that’s what I crave at the edge of the forest
but tonight I am lucky
I have found my brethren and a man
who knows how to get things,
to get things done
to rob from farmhouses, from inns
from taverns, to waylay
people on the road
and what is that sound at the window?

I thought I heard something.

I haven’t eat this well in weeks
been this warm
never mind what had to happen
for us to get it
to gather together to break bread
we here brothers now
fill our hungry bellies
same as you’d do if you’d been
turned out on the road left for dead
and become
a beast in the night
you’d willingly set the table
and dig in, not pause for breath
because life is short, brutish.
A meal might be your last

Is that a scratching at the window?
I swear I‘d heard something,

save some beer for me will ya
there’s cake and my hands
are warm I can feel my hands tonight
and

we’ll sleep good tonight
never mind whose house this is
forget about it, they knew this was
part of the world, it is the gamble
of being alive, they knew that every breath
could be their last and this land, this house,
this meal, this could end and they’d gladly
claim their heavenly reward
and for once i am happy
for the prospect of a warm bed,
we are the beasts of the night
of the dark woods and is there
something greater than us?
A judge, you say?
A witch you say?
In this forest?