Elbows

Let me tell you a story

About my elbows

When I was younger

Younger, meaning just a few years ago

I was in horrible pain

My elbows

I decided to divide my arms up

First the left side

I took a hacksaw in my right hand

I cut off my left arm, just below the elbow.

I then struggled to wrap a tourniquet

Just below my elbow

Using my right hand

And my

Teeth

I can assure you it was very difficult

After wrapping the lower portion of my severed left arm in wet gauze

I placed it in a huge thermal container of ice

The next part

I took the hacksaw again

With my right hand

And cut just above my left elbow

I placed my left elbow

In a jar filled with formaldehyde

I then unwrapped the lower portion of my arm

From its frozen gauze

Placed it on the table and lined up my now shortened

Left arm

I removed the tourniquet

Steadily, with my right hand and my

Teeth

I sewed my lower left arm to the upper left arm

My elbow

Now

Gone

The next part proved itself quite difficult

I’m a right-handed person, not

Left

I took the hacksaw in my left hand

And cut off the lower part of my right arm

This was difficult because I could not remain steady

I did not have a clean cut

Quite jagged

Ripped

And

Torn

But I managed to remove the lower part of my right arm

And like the left

Next came wet gauze, ice, tourniquet.

Following along

I then cut off my right elbow

And placed the right elbow

In a separate jar from the left elbow

And like before

Following the steps previously

Only extremely more difficult

With my left hand and teeth

I sewed my lower right arm to my upper right arm

In the past you have incorrectly perceived me

To be a man with two elbows

What you don’t know about me

Until now

Was that I am man

With no elbows

Except for my two jars at home

Each containing

An

Elbow

© 2011 David Greg Harth