2 minute read
Quality Button
from How To Die Laughing
by Pablo Byrne
QUALITY BUTTON Searching for the Quality button On a jar of strawberry jam I was prompted to ponder the question Of just what it is that I am
The inner tubes that keep me alive The arteries and the veins The pipes and tracts and glands And ducts that every body contains
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Imagine all those blood-filled lines That simple sanguine self Red and blue – like a nursery rhyme The violet and rose of good health
Our beating hearts that thump away So our blood can keep on flowing Through thousands of miles of tiny tubes To keep our complexion glowing!
These vessels share a crowded space We harbour such a mess While the brain keeps skulking silently Up there in its cosy head nest
Then there’s the intestinal gut Those gurgling smelly parts Transforming all we gobble up Into pee and pooh and farts
While leaving behind some nutrients Proteins, fats and carbs Minerals, water and vitamins All absorbed in a matter of yards!
So what serves what, why are we thus It’s obvious I suppose To a doctor or a high priestess Or maybe there’s no one who knows
And why is it that we differ so Being basically all the same Imagine if we had a button like that That could put us out of the game
And so I catch my breath, inhale Now there’s another story The air we breathe, suck in, let out At least that bits not all gory
What of the soul, I ask myself For somewhere it resides In this visceral home of blood and bone That we like to call our ‘insides’
Now I must dash to catch the Tube The irony is yawning Another bloody clot on board Like every working day morning
Still time to pay the groceries Though I really can’t be late The jam´s without a quality button And I don’t have a sell by date
In the metro we are taciturn Though everyone has a voice We share so many private parts How can privacy be a choice
A skinny bag of gristle and guts Cloaked in cloth and shame Most like to keep themselves to themselves Anonymous, but all the same
The miracles of life go on For humans and strawberries too The fruit gets put in a punnet While we live in the Human Zoo
