Crawford Long

Yesterday morning I cut my thumb pretty badly. I let my inability to stand still get the best of me and I tried to dig hard brownies out of a pan. I spent the entire day fretting over my finger trying to decide whether or not I needed stitches. The whole ordeal reminds me of a Sylvia Plath poem except with a little less thrill and alot more frustration.


Cut


What a thrill -
My thumb instead of an onion.
The top quite gone
Except for a sort of hinge

Of skin,
A flap like a hat,
Dead white.
Then that red plush.

Little pilgrim,
The Indian's axed your scalp.
Your turkey wattle
Carpet rolls

Straight from the heart.
I step on it,
Clutching my bottle
Of pink fizz. A celebration, this is.
Out of a gap
A million soldiers run,
Redcoats, every one.

Whose side are they one?
O my
Homunculus, I am ill.
I have taken a pill to kill

The thin
Papery feeling.
Saboteur,
Kamikaze man -

The stain on your
Gauze Ku Klux Klan
Babushka
Darkens and tarnishes and when
The balled
Pulp of your heart
Confronts its small
Mill of silence

How you jump -
Trepanned veteran,
Dirty girl,
Thumb stump.

Sylvia Plath

Once expert opinions had been distributed and considered I went to the hospital. A hospital in the heart of Atlanta at 10:00 at night is filled with interesting people.
Purple bandanas, huge melons and little red slippers. It is also filled with surprise powdered doughnuts, coke, hangman and silly jokes about silly things. Two hours later, sugar high finally wearing off, my fingered was glued back into position and I was thankful for friends and insurance.

Me "She cut bangs."
Johnathon " She cut bangs? What are you, a caveman?"
Me "No....She cut baaaaangs"