20150721 (gross anatomy)

This will have to do. I kinda got faint looking for the right image for
"fractured humerus."

It took a bone from a butcher

To make me realize 

That these things were within us

Making our shape holding us up

It was a huge industrial strength bone too

Maybe the knee of a cow smaller 

Than a shoulder I imagine

I can’t remember why perhaps

My landlord’s dog this big thing

I needed to placate she kept him

In a cage that ran from the side 

Of her garage up to a fence

Enclosing the little flagstone patio

Beneath the tree once an excellent place

For outdoor barbecue now a chain link

WC for her dog her two teenage sons

Lazy to the point of stereotype neglected

The dog the mess the stench she used to

Leave him on a second floor common 

Porch to which we each had access

Under duress they washed the porch 

Hosing it down from below  

Since the porch had no gutters 

You had to check before leaving

Our back door lest brown rain down on you

I think the bones I brought from work

Each week were the poor pup’s only joy

I’d seen skeletons anatomy books

Sometimes I’d get queasy looking

Fainted seeing blood despite that 

Knowledge still regarded bodies

With infantile naivety much like cartoon figures

Two-dimensional shaped of their outline

I could feel my own ribs elbows knees 

But never gave thought to the bones

As the cause for their shape until 

I examined a couple of joints before taking

Them out to the dog manipulated the parts

Observed how the tendons kept them 

Together but permitted the motion

Can’t quite say what I thought was

Inside me before this epiphany

I knew we weren’t just inflated 

Like figured balloons even my 

High school biology course hadn’t

Converted my spiritus to corpus 

So lively and conscious my existence

Breaking my left humerus

On New Year’s eve Y2K clinched

The deal offered a whole new suffering 

I’d fallen on slick ice while walking our dog

Somehow I rose from flat on my back

To standing feeling my left arm dangling

Worse than any participle ever made it 

To the first house nearby rang the bell

Opening the door the teenie-bopper screamed

Slammed it shut turned off the porch lamp

Ringing again an older man this time

Could see I was in pain called my home

X-rays showed a slight fracture 

No bone jutting through skin

Didn’t calm me down they didn’t

Operate nor cast just some inflatable

Foam wrapped round with my 

Lower arm in a tidy blue sling

Pain pills my ass in a recliner for 

Six weeks got some great reading done

Attention magnet people fawning all over 

Played it to the hilt but

Never cast doubt again of

What gave me form

c. J.S.Manista, 2015