Bigger ball’s, that's what's needed, one to keep us marching toward the destination in life. Another to keep our affections direct and clear as possible, all to easily the storm in the head becomes the storm in the heart. I knew a guy, Ed Lang, small stumpy blue eyed stutterer, who had to have an emergency operation, the cord of his epididymis entangled around his right testicle, as the swell increased, so did the pain. He called NHS 24, under the cold yellow sun of a summer night, while anxiously rolling the telephone cord between index and thumb. He had to go, the nurse assured, to get the cord untangled, if left to late, it would be lost. Some joked that his testicle had tried to commit suicide by tying the cord into a noose, for he was shy and unassuming in regard to sex; rumour has it he sails yachts around South America, with only a tiny surgical scar to remind him of that summer emergency years ago.
Another guy, the slightly camp, slender, brown-eyed olive skin Jonathan, 18 consultant of the vanity box, browning his skin, under UV light, he only had one testicle, his scrotum had a scar in the shape of a tiny mouth or a purse zipper. His epididymis had entangled round his left ball, before I ever knew him. After the operation, he could still get it up, enjoy the finer things in bed. His gender identity kit may well have been changed, but it had not corrupted his selfhood, rumour has it he lives somewhere in London, sharing only one thing in common with Hitler. Some joked he had enjoyed so much sex his testicle was sending him a warning against promiscuity. Now come my balls, cancerous; found out a month ago, I never examined them with the precision the medical propaganda demanded. Roll them, between thumb and index finger, no pain should come, if you notice any lumps visit your G.P. I never did roll them often - my man dice! My bowling puns. I hoped for merely a cyst, a cord infection, but no luck, after ultra sound, it had been confirmed, it had been written. Finally, strange Mother, something was growing inside of me.
As I lie on a hospital bed, window view, looking out over the city from the Royal Infirmary, a dark purple sky above me, I sigh nervously, amongst purple shadows. I consider the testicles, tucked beneath fabric and norm, a gallery of eyeballs. I laugh and snort, shaking my head with a wry grin, thinking of the immaturity of our shyness. Two balls, the Sun and Mercury, fixing the trajectory of my fate. Some barely care to air them. I imagine a scene from my childhood - eight years old, a summer naked, licking into a pink ice-cream, sand blows onto the head. I lick it without knowing, salt and grit corrupt the taste. I screw my eyes and scrunch my face like eating something sour and ugly. My Mother smirks- don't get upset over anything so trivial. My Father offers to swap. The strawberry ice-cream trickles through my knuckles and fingers, I throw it on the sand and let it melt, running on to ask my brother how life is in the water.
Tears well in the ducts, salt of nostalgia and neurosis, cheer up; you will be back again, for more days, months, years, decades. Think of the odds, to live to die, all whim and chance of the past the future, and the inability to get anything back from time, then the peace of the present moment. Then, two testicles call you one Morning into the bathroom, you roll the dice, and the odds are against you, and you hold your breath, and think of a holiday in Spain, squinting at the sun, eating an orange as the juice dribbles down the chin. Think of the firm buttocks of your teenage years, sprinting through the forest, and all the boys with buttocks that were perfect, and immortal. Think of the girls with long hairless white legs that you wanted to smooth with the care and caress of a clay sculptor. Here I am an invalid, barely a man, naked to the future.
The moment is an orange in the mouth. Eat it carefully or tear it apart. Everything has a limit. Really, it might not be so bad, only 45 minutes. Imagine the face of God: the penis = the nose. The eyes = the testicles. The mop of hair = the pubic hair. There is nothing to worry about. Write a season of love letters when this is over. Rub your balls together; roll them for luck, one last time. The Nurses have arrived. 'Mr Knight, the time has come, we must administer the anaesthetic.' I'm rolled out into the corridor, with a tranquilised smile on, holding back a drugged laugh. I hear the patter of bare feet upon the linoleum, the bare feet of a young girl, in white gown, with blonde hair and green eyes. She grips the bed, the nurses do not notice, she leans over and looks directly into my eyes, then let’s go and is gone. She terrified me, an apparition; I lapse into reverie, mumbling as I drift off: '...chandeliers of green grapes, chandeliers of red grapes, try some, please, delicious and cold.'
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