Watch Your Broccoli Sprouts

Proficient in “metaphoricals,” but lacking in “metonymicals,” it was decided he had some finesse for the “synecdochicals.” It mattered to no one on the staff that they were bastardizing the terms in this official report they were collating, but someone had to get rid of that little bastard language “prefigurator”—no matter how many neologisms they cranked out.

“Norms was norms,” and this non-normative fellow could not stand—would not stand—in the department!

So they devised a plan to spike his broccoli sprouts with psilocybin bits—that would fix him for good!—before he presented at the symposium.

So much for his disquisition on Thee Synergies of the Literary Fruits of Charles Bukowski and Judy Grahn: Thee Literary Love Story. It was destined for doom, his presentation, because of his “turgidity” and “floridness”—and his altered state of consciousness.

But the talk was especially memorable as he waxed aphasic (Wernicke’s) occasionally spouting something about ladybugs, Blind Lemon Jefferson, and a case of plantar fasciitis. There was bafflement among the attendees—worried looks—but once he summed it up by saying:

“Baby Gongas are fierce … harrumph … hooray!”

To the departmental staff’s dismay there ensued a thunderous 10-minute long standing ovation.

The moral here is … wash and watch! your broccoli sprouts—and Baby Gongas always win the day!

That’s the philosophy of my life.

“Oh, you shouldn’t do that / Don’t you know, you’ll stain the carpet? / … Oh, she does just like Sister Ray said …”

—Lou Reed / “Sister Ray”