"Speak low if you speak love..." (Much Ado)

..... I've always been saddened by the story of the two great lovers, Pyramus and Thisbe. Oh, I suppose everyone knows about Antony and Cleopatra and Romeo and Juliet and Pygmalion and Galatea but Pyramus and Thisbe? Perhaps not. But once in one's life one needs to know about true love and Shakespeare said, "Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds..." In other words, love doesn't die because of a great problem, which is the kind of problem these two lovers encountered. They both lived in Babylon the city of Semiramis in houses so close together that one wall separated them both. They were both beautiful young people and as time went on they learned to love each other and desired to marry. However, their parents forbade it--for reasons unknown. Maybe Thisbe was Jewish.

.....Fortunately, in that wall between the houses, there was a little chink which heretofore no one had noticed. The two lovers then, although they could not see each other or kiss, they were able to whisper sweetly to each other and as night came on they pressed kisses to the wall which could not go through to the lips on the other side. As time wore on their love grew passionately and exponentially, and one dark night they agreed to slip away into the countryside and meet by the Tomb of Ninus. While Thisbe waited for Pyramus she saw a lioness with mouth all bloody from a recent kill. The beast was far enough away for Thisbe to run and escape, but as she fled she dropped her cloak. The lioness came upon it and ripped it apart covering it with blood. (Aha! now you're getting the idea!). When Pyramus came and saw the cloak he kissed it again and again knowing that she had died. He believed it was he who bore the guilt for not being able to protect her, so he went below a mulberry tree whose berries were snow white upon the ground. He took his sword and plunged it into his side. Shortly, Thisbe, believing she was now safe went back to the site of the tryst and there beneath the tree she saw her dead lover and vowing never to be separated from him plunged his sword into her heart and the blood of these two lovers turned the mulberry tree's berries red and ever since the berries of a mulberry tree are red. The two were united in death and the parents placed their ashes together into one urn. Why does life deal ill unto good people? Also, where was Zeus all this time? No doubt chasing women.

.....In Shakespeare's "Midsummer Night's Dream" he pokes fun at this mythical story by having "mechanicals" perform "Pyramus and Thisbe" before a gathering in a forest--a play within a play. One guy--a tinker or plumber, I believe, is given a leading role of the chink in the wall; now if I played the chink I would put my thumb and index finger together in order to make a little hole for speaking through; another plays moonlight; another performs the part of the lion. I don't believe this play would go over in Shakespeare in the park. Perhaps on HBO.