This is a gap scene within Hamlet that we had to write for a class assignment . . . we acted it out too:)
Act 3, Scene 1 – Act 3, Scene 2:
Hamlet:She needs no fare
When crossing the dark waters with Charon;
Her open legs are fare enough. So fair,
That even Cerberus refuses to feast
Upon her flesh, but rather quell his hunger (5)
At her whore's request. Oh, how her moans
Still resound in my head; the memory of her warm
Flesh trapping me like a blanket.
She is like Demeter's flower, an orchid
Of the finest silk petals, stained with purple satin – (10)
Then the winter comes,
And she dies. And winter shows no mercy:
Freezing the clear, reflective ponds,
Trapping the fish and the mermaids
Beneath the mirrored ice. (15)
The first snowfall of winter approaches, its delicate
Flakes falling freely
Through the sky, as quickly as if it were liquid mercury,
Burying the flower beneath a vast blanket of quicksilver.
Too soon the seasons change again, and spring dawns (20)
Upon the shadow of this cold, dark realm, thawing
The ice and melting the snow. The fish have survived,
But the mermaid –
The mermaid who is still half human –
Hath drowned beneath winter's rage. The snow clears away,(25)
And the flower still remains; yet
Her fragile body, its soft, violet petals, remain broken,
Eternally welting in the melting snow. Oh, Ophelia,
How you've betrayed me! How you burn
The flowers in my heart like a flame burning (30)
The wax of a candle, watching from its perch upon the wick,
Watching as the wax melts down the body
Of the red candle, pooling
At its base to form a viscous quantity
Of incarnate liquid. (35)
Voice: Forget Ophelia . . .
Hamlet:Father? I hear your voice, but cannot find your
Ghost. Father
Where are you?
Voice: Forget Ophelia . . . (40)
Hamlet: I cannot remember how to
Forget.
Voice: Forget Ophelia . . .
Hamlet:You cannot forgetWho you love and who you hate! You cannot forget (45)
When all the meaning in your life has been
Deterred by a longing, a determination
For vengeance. You cannot forget
The sharp, recessive pain of
Loss . . . (50)
Love . . .
Betrayal . . .
Voice: Forget Ophelia . . .
Hamlet: Get out of my head! Stop telling me to forget
When I can only remember. (55)
I cannot forget
How to remember!
Voice: Forget Ophelia . . .
Hamlet:Enough! It is your fault that I cannot forget
Her; your fault that she no longer loves (60)
Me! Your fault that she has a reason to hate
Me! This is all because of
You – you and your polluted, vengeful
Ghost!
Voice: Forget, Hamlet, (65)
You must learn to forget . . .
Hamlet:Why has you nature suddenly become
Hypocritical? Why do you vex me
To forget when you yourself
Refuse to forget? Why can't you forget? (70)
If you only could have had courage enough to forget
Your brother's betrayal, forget
My mother's incestuous longing, forget
The cause of your unjust murder,
Ophelia would still love (75)
Me! But now Ophelia
Fears and despises me – because of you!
And I am left alone – because of you!
And my mother is a whore – because of you!
And Claudius rules your fallen throne – because of you! (80)
Everything is falling apart – all the seams of time are slowly
Beginning to unweave, tearing a hole through the allied
Stars, raging wars within the Heavens. All this chaos is
Because of you. I despise you!
You are like a garden of leeches (85)
Drowning through the water until you rest
Upon a mermaid's rotting flesh, reawakening
Your pitiful life as you feast upon her blood; the same poison
Which bestowed
You to your earthly throne, as you rule the forests, whose floors(90)
Remain matted with dampened, decomposing leaves.
And you rest upon that throne, drinking the life
Out of me, filling my head
With your vengeance, your desires, stealing
My own life – my own will to live – just to fulfill (95)
Your sleepless vengeance. You have corrupted
My mind with your killing
Games, reducing me to nothing but
A walking corpse! – Yet what are you?
Your forgotten leeches' spirit falls away, and her open (100)
Wounds continue to bleed, her blood infusing itself with the black
Sea, forming a pool of incarnate
Wine – and you mark me a corpse?
A corpse
Unfit to even lay inn the presence of Hades' throne . . . unfit(105)
To be targeted by the storms
Of fire that fall from the sky.
Please forgive me
Father . . .
Please . . . (110)
Please . . .
Please . . .
Forgive me . . .
I am so lost, so . . . empty! Emptier
Than tombs without bones, graves (115)
Without souls. Everyone has
Turned against me and I am so very
Lonely!
I vow to avenge
You . . . Father . . . (120)