Thu, 19 May 2005

Baby Born Without a Torso
That damn quack doctor actually had the gall to say “Oh, but he’s a little fella, ain’t he?”. Owing us a torso (attached or not; we weren’t going to be overly difficult about this), we refused to leave the operating room until we had the whole of our child. The baby, who we had agreed to name Otto, had apparently taken to taken to the prenatal communications classes we’d had given him by speakers placed around my wife’s belly, for he kept pointing at the doctor and looking bothered, knowing there was something missing.

Chorus: otto, otto, such a starfish
you obstetrician’s one bizarre wish
hidden deep within his sock
your body’s missing organ block

It’s as though the doctor’s hired the nurses strictly for the ferocity of their screams, though they come now not in terror but laughter at the imitation of said doctor done by my wife; we are all agreed that we are sick-sick-sick of medical atrocity. Peddle your apples on some other streetcorner whydontcha. otto is already starting his own band; the torsoless infant market is very big overseas. Consider charts of the cleanliness of the utensils, the glare of light off the fresh-waxed floor, the angle of legs and hands. There is no reason for us not to have the torso returned to us. There is still such a thing as manners, after all.

Chorus: we are sick sick sick (sick sick sick sick)
sick sick sick sick (we are sick sick sick)
and more to the point, it’s become an embarrassment
the audience wondering where all his talent went

They’re already selling torsoless dolls in the entryway. My boy Otto has become a person of great privilege in all of twelve minutes, all of which could have been averted had we only been given the torso. He won’t return my calls, jetting bicoastal, experimenting with the political attributes of stardom. My wife is still heavily medicated and acts out cruel parodies of everyone she’s ever known. She’s currently chopping the metaphorical legs out from her third grade class, in alphabetical order. Terrible, atrocious things. My wife’s mother, Julia, told me once that my wife hit puberty incredibly early and has always since been uncomfortable inside her body. This is borne out in the malicious sketches my wife performs on the operating table. The doctor had to leave. I attempted to follow him. To retrieve the torso, but my wife demanded we leave the torso be: “too late, too late”, she laughed.

I assure you, this will be the last child I ever have.
(12:06.05.19.2005) [/alpha] #