“The Foxy Grandpa, Billy the Poet”

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By

Is sex death?

"What in the hell is a girl with hips like yours doing selling death?"

The only sexual beauty that an ordinary Human being can see is in the woman who will kill him. Could the answer be in a 'Monkey house?' How do I love thee, let me count…

These perverted women were sisters from the Ethical Suicide Service.

"The folks who understood science agreed that folks oughta stop making so many babies and the folks who understood morals agreed that society would collapse if people used sex for nothing but pleasure."

"The people who have been most eager to rule, to make the laws, to enforce the laws and to tell everybody exactly how God wants things to be here on Earth - these people have forgiven themselves and their friends for anything and everything. But, they have been absolutely disgusted and terrified by the natural sexuality of common men and women."

WE are constantly bombarded with signs and progressive directions to the future. There are smart phones and video devices that do astounding things. But what about the people…what will they be like? Will we continue to be separated by racial, cultural, or religious differences - makeup of identity…or would we, will we simply abandon the way of life to which we have been accustomed - the way things have been done in the past?

I've noticed some changes. Albeit, some things do remain the same - what are the differences between men and women? They're relationships? Do you think sexual relationships would be promiscuous, random, set by appointment, or would there be a controlling element to suppress copulation? Do you think babies would be conceived in the same manner as today or would there be no sexual functions at all in a future society? What would you say to the elimination of population explosions? Suppose babies were born in or out of test tubes or some other manufacturing mis-adventurous manner? What would you say to the possibility of laws put in place that would require individuals to request permission from the authorities in order to participate in consensual sexual activity? Remember the foreshadowing 'Sci-Fi thriller "1984," written by George Orwell or the movie "THX1138," staring Robert Duvall? Can you imagine a future where there is no desire for sex - men and women alike?

Come with me as I attempt to tell you a science fiction tale of mystery, crime, and passion. Let's take a look forward while we re-examine a story written by Mr. Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. His version of 'A Sexy Grandpa' has definitely caught my attention since the story was told more than forty years ago. The M. O. or Modus operandi (plural modi operandi) - [Latin, Method of working.] A term used by law enforcement authorities; is a Latin phrase, approximately translated as "mode of operation". The term is used to describe someone's habits... mo·dus op·er·an·di (m d s p -r n d, -d). n. pl. mo·di operandi (m d , -d ) Abbr. MO. 1. A method of operating or functioning. 2. A person's manner of working; of "Billy The Poet."

The Sheriff of Barnstable County, Cape Cod was named Pete Caldron. The town came equipped with Federal Suicide Parlors. The came under the jurisdiction of the Federal Ethical Suicide Service in Hyannis Port. The suicide parlors were operated and maintained by attendants. Each individual parlor was ran by two six-foot hostesses. In May, on a warm afternoon, the sheriff was making his rounds when he entered one of the parlors. His intent was not to alarm the hostesses but to warn them. "Good day ladies. I'm passing out these posters to let you and your customers - uh, excuse me, your clients know that 'Billy' is at it again."

Sheriff Caldron was referring to a "Popped head" named Billy. His M. O. caused him to be known as "Billy the Poet."

"He is believed to be headed this way," said Caldron. "The service doesn't want you to be alarmed over this, because he will soon be captured."

A "Popped Head" is a person who refuses to take his or her 'Ethical Birth Control Pills' three times a day; morning, noon, and night. The penalty for such a non-action was $15,000 and 12 years in jail. This legal ramification occurred at a time when the population of Earth was populated by 50 billion human beings. The number was far too great for so many people on such a small planet. People were virtually packed together like so many trout in a hatchery - packed together to breed in order to feed the masses. Scientists have descried the meshed mass as drupelets. These are the pulpy little knobs that are found outside of a raspberry; as one of the individual pericarps composing the blackberry.

The World Government was implementing a two-pronged attack on world overpopulation. One such attack consisted of encouragement of ethical suicide. This act was composed of people going to the nearest suicide parlor and asking a hostess to painlessly kill you while you lay on a lounger. The insisted upon directive is compulsory ethical birth control.

Pete told the women, who were pretty, tough-minded, and highly intelligent, roadblocks were being set up as well as other efforts, including house-to-house searches in order to catch the poet. The central difficulty is identifying Billy. No one, including the police knows who Billy is. They had no idea what he looked like. The few people who did know him or at least seen him to know him for what he was - and they even disagreed on his description. They did agree on his height, hair color, his voice, his weight, and the color of his skin. The sheriff said, "I don't need to remind you girls," he went on with a frown, "that a popped head is very sensitive from the waist down. If the poet slides in here and starts causing trouble, one good swift kick between the legs will do wonders." As to what the good sheriff was referring is the fact that ethical birth-control pills, the only legal form of birth control, made people numb from the waist down.

Many of the men stated the bottom halves of the body felt like cold iron or balsawood. The women concurred their bottom halves felt like wet cotton or stale ginger ale. The pills were so effective that you could blindfold a man who had taken one, tell him to recite the 'Gettysburg Address,' kick him in the balls while he recited, and he wouldn't miss a syllable. These pills were ethical because they didn't interfere with a persons' ability to reproduce, which would have been unnatural and immoral. The pills took away all the pleasure of having sex. Thus did science and morals go, hand-in-hand.

The two hostesses there in Hyannis were Nancy McCallister and Mary Carmichael. Nancy was a strawberry blonde while Mary was raven-haired beauty. Their uniforms were a swizzle color of pink, blue, and white. They wore tastefully colored lipstick, heavy eye makeup, and black body stockings with nothing underneath, and black knee-high shiny patent leather boots. During a really good week, say the week before Christmas, they might put sixty people to sleep. The technique was delivered via a hypodermic needle injection.

"The message I'm giving you girls," said Caldron, is that everything's under control. You can go on about your business as usual."

"Didn't you leave out part of your message?" Mary asked.

"I don't know what you mean."

"We didn't hear you say he might be coming straight for us."

Caldron shrugged in humbling clumsy innocence. "Well…we're not sure."

"We were under the impression that all anybody knew about Billy The Poet was that he specializes in deflowering hostesses in ethical suicide parlors." Mary and Nancy were virgins. All hostesses are virgins. They also had to hold advanced degrees in nursing and psychology. They are required to be plump and rosy, at not less than six feet tall.

America had changed in many ways, but it had yet to adopt the metric system. Mary Collins was fuming. She was insulted by the sheriff's attempt to protect her and Nancy from the full truth about Billy - as though they might panic if they heard it. She espoused her views to Pete Caldron with an in-your-face method.

"How long do you think a girl would last in the E. S. S. if she scared that easily?" spit Mary.

The sheriff took a few steps back, pulled in his chin, "Not very long, I guess."

"That's very true," Nancy said, closing the distance between she and Caldron. She showed him the edge of her hand, poised for a Karate Chop. All hostesses were experts at Judo, Karate, and several other martial arts. "If you'd like to find out how helpless we are, just come toward me - pretend you're Billy The Poet." Sheriff Caldron shook his head, gave her a punkish smile. "I'd rather not."

"That's the smartest thing you've said today," said Nancy, turning her back on Caldron while Mary laughed. "We're not scared - we're angry." "Shit," said Mary, "we're not even that, we're pissed. He's not worth the time. We're bored. How boring is he to come such a great distance and cause all this fuss, in order to -" she let the sentence die there. "It's too absurd."

"I'm not as mad at him as I am at the women who let him do it to them without a struggle" - said Mary - "who let him do it and then couldn't tell the cops what he looks like. A suicide hostess at that!"

"Somebody hasn't been keeping up with her martial arts training," said Nancy.

It wasn't just the poet who was attracted to the hostesses in ethical suicide parlors. All 'Popped heads' were. Bombed out of their skulls with the sex madness that came from not taking the pills. They thought the white lips, big eyes, body stockings, and boots of a hostess spelled sex, sex, and more sex. The truth was, of course, that sex was the last thing any hostess ever had in mind. "If the poet follows his usual M. O., he'll study your habits and the neighborhood. Then he'll pick one of your and send you a dirty poem in the mail," said Caldron.

"Charming," said Nancy.

The sheriff came back with… "The Poet has also been known to use the telephone."

"How brave," replied Nancy. Over the sheriff's shoulder, Nancy could see the mailman coming. A blue light came on over the door of a booth for which Nancy was responsible. The person inside wanted something. It was the only booth in use at the time.

Caldron asked Nancy if there was a possibility that the person in the booth was Billy The Poet. The hostess replied, "Well if it is, I can damn well break his neck with my thumb and forefinger."

"Yo, it's a Foxy Grandpa," said Mary. She'd seen the person too. A foxy grandpa was an old man, cute and senile, who quibbled and joked and reminisced for hours and hours before letting a hostess put him to sleep. Mary and Nancy half smiled and groaned, "We've spent the past two hours trying to decide on a last meal." The mailman came into the shop. He only had one letter for this address. It was addressed to Nancy. With splendor, bewilderment, and disgust, she opened it. She was experiencing a woman's intuition. She knew it was from Billy The Poet.

Upon opening it, she was right. The envelope concealed a poem from Billy. It wasn't an original poem. It was a song from olden days that had taken on new meanings since the numbers of ethical birth control went universal. The song, written in smeary pencil, stated:

"We were walking through the park, a-goosing statues in the dark, if Sherman's horse can take it, so can you."

The Foxy Grandpa continued his recline upon the mint-green Barca-lounger. He summoned the hostess, Nancy. She came into the booth to see what he wanted. Hundreds had died peacefully on that lounger over the years. The old man studied the Howard Johnson's menu, which happened to be next door to the parlor; most, if not at all, of them were. The lounger was located in a painted cinder-blocked room. Under a lime colored Venetian blind, was one barred window.

Many of us have, at one time or another, identified or equated a Howard Johnson's Restaurant with its bright orange roof. The suicide parlors, right next door, had roofs or purple. They were both government run. Practically everything was the Government. Practically everything was automated too.

The average citizen usually moped around home and watched television, which was the government. Caldron, Mary, and Nancy were lucky to have jobs. Many…most people didn't. Fifteen mandatory minutes of government television would urge the common citizen to vote…to vote intelligently or to consume intelligently, and to worship in church. Oh yes, I've almost forgotten to mention, love your fellow man and obey the laws - or pay a call to the nearest Ethical Suicide Parlor. It is there one may find out how friendly and understanding a hostess could be.

Marked by old age, the Foxy Grandpa was something of a rarity. He was usually bald, shaky, and had spots on his hands. The old man appeared to look twenty-two, like most people. The spots were proof enough when the sweet bird of youth refused the curt advance of age shadowing…the sweet bird of youth had flown the coop.

"Have you decided on dinner…a last supper?" Nancy asked. Peevishly, she heard, in her own voice, heard herself betray her exasperation with the old man. She was ashamed of her boredom with the old man. She was ashamed of her un-professionalism. He said, "The Breaded Veal Cutlets are very good…indeed." The hostess looked at the old man and half smiled.

With the greedy cunning of a second childhood, the old man cocked his head to one side. He'd caught her being un-professional and unkind. He intended to punish her for it. "You ain't soundin to friendly Missy. I thought you all was supposed to be friendly. I thought this place is supposed to be a good and peaceful place…a place to come to at the end."

"I'm sorry sir…I beg your pardon," said Nancy. "If I appear to be unfriendly, it doesn't have anything to do with you, sir."

"I thought maybe…I was boring you."

"No, not at all," she said. "You know many very interesting stories…historical ones at that. I was very impressed to hear that you knew J. Edgar Nation, the father of Ethical Birth Control. I didn't know that he was from Grand Rapids, Michigan."

"Then look like you're interested damn it!" the old man snapped as he thought to himself, "I can get away with this sort of impudence. The thing is, I can leave at anytime I wish, right up to the moment they attempt to stick me with that fuckin needle. That's the law."

So Nancy sat down in the booth, pretending to marvel at the yarn being told by the old man. A story everyone knew. The citizens knew how J. Edgar Nation happened to experiment with ethical birth control. "He had no idea his pills would be taken by human beings," said the Foxy Grandpa. "His dream was to introduce morality into the monkey house at the Grand Rapids Zoo. Did you know that?" he inquired with severity.

"No. No, I didn't…that's very informative."

"He and his fourteen kids went to church one bright and sunny Easter morning. The day was so nice and the church service had been so beautiful and pure, they decided to take a walk through the zoo. They were walking on clouds."

Nancy heard the telephone ringing, and nagingly, through the so-called soundproof door. The scene described was lifted from a play that was performed on TV every Easter Sunday. The Foxy Grandpa shoehorned himself into the scene. He also described himself chatting with the Nation family just before the got to the monkey house. "Good morning, Mr. Nation," I said to him. "It certainly is a nice morning."

"And a good morning to you, Mr. Howard," he said to me. "There is nothing like an Easter morning to make a man feel clean and reborn and at one with God's intentions."

The telephone continued to ring.

"So we went to the monkey house together, and what do you think we saw?"

"I can't imagine." Nancy answered. Someone answered the phone.

"We saw a monkey playing with his genitals!"

"No!"

"Yes! And J. Edgar Nations was so upset he went straight home and started developing a pill that would make monkeys do things that are fit for Christian families to see."

There came a knock at the door of the booth.

"Yes -?" Said Nancy. "Nancy." Mary said quietly through the door of the booth. "Yes -?" Said Nancy.

"Nancy," said Mary, "the telephone is for you."

When Nancy came out of the booth, she found the sheriff jumping, coughing, and choking on little squeals of law enforcement delight. Government agents tapped the telephone line. They were hidden in the Howard Johnson eatery, right next door. The poet was believed to be on the line. The call had been traced…to him. The police were already hurrying on their way to nab him.

"Keep him on, keep him on the line, "Caldron whispered to Nancy as he handed her the receiver. He handled it as if it were solid gold.

"Yes -?" Said Nancy.

"Nancy McCallister?" A man's voice said. The voice was disguised. He sounded like he was talking through a kazoo. "I'm calling for a mutual friend."

"Oh?"

"He asked me to deliver a message."

"I see."

"It's a poem."

"All right."

"Ready?"

"Ready." Nancy heard sirens screaming in the background noise of the call. The caller heard the sirens too, but began reciting the poem anyway. He recited without emotion. The poem read:

"Soak yourself in Jergen's Lotion. Here comes the one-man population explosion."

Nancy could hear thumping and clanging noises right after the man's recital. She heard garbled cries of distress and pleading over the telephone line. The cops got him. She felt depressed as she hung up the telephone receiver. Nancy's brave body was prepared for a fight. A fight that would never be…

The sheriff bounced under his brown fedora. He joyfully bounced his rotund body out of the suicide parlor. He was in a great hurry to see the infamous criminal he'd help to capture. In Caldron's haste, he was unaware that he'd dropped a sheaf of papers from his trench coat pocket. Mary picked up the bundle and called after him. He stopped for a moment. He told her the papers didn't matter any more. He then asked Mary if she'd like to accompany him. A flurry developed between the girls. Nancy persuaded Mary to go. The successful persuasion by Nancy was actually owed to Mary's intense curiosity about Billy. Mary left with Pete. She gave the sheriff's papers to Nancy prior to leaving. The bundle, upon opening, proved to be photocopies of poems sent by the poet to hostesses in other locations. Nancy read the one on the top of the sheaf. It made much of a peculiar side effect related to the use of ethical birth control pills. The writings expressed a warning: not only did they make people numb - they also made people pass blue piss. Among the papers and photocopies was one particular poem. It read:

"I did not sow, I did not spin, and thanks to pills I did not sin. I loved the crowds, the stink, the noise... I ate beneath a roof of orange; swung with progress like a door hinge, neath purple roof I've come today to piss my azure life away. Virgin hostess, death's recruiter, life is cute, but you are cuter. Mourn my pecker, purple daughter - all it passed was sky blue water."

"Have you never heard that story before - about how J. Edgar Nation came to invent ethical birth control?" The Foxy Grandpa asked.

"Never did," replied the unnerved and lying hostess.

"I thought everybody knew the story."

"It's news to me," Nancy said, continuing the lie.

"Well, when he got through the monkey house, you couldn't tell it from the Michigan Supreme Court. Meanwhile, there was this crisis going on in the United Nations. The folks who understood science agreed that folks oughta stop making so many babies. And the folks who understood morals agreed that society would collapse if people used sex for nothing but pleasure."

The Foxy Grandpa got off the lounger, walked over to the window, and pried the two slats of the window-blind apart. There wasn't more to see outside. The view from the window was partly blocked by the backside of twenty-five foot high thermometer. It faced outward to the street for all to see. The thermometer was calibrated to count and report the number of people on the planet. It counted the billions of people on Earth starting from zero to twenty. The fake column of liquid was a strip of translucent red plastic. The thing displayed how many people there were on this tiny planet. A black arrow, close to the bottom, showed what the scientists thought the population ought to be.

The old man watched the setting Sun through the red plastic covering the interior of the window. His face appeared shadowy and banded from the sunlight by the blinds and plastic.

"Tell me -" he said. "When I die, how much will that thermometer go down? A foot?"

"No."

"An inch?"

"Not quite."

He faced her and said, "You know what the answer is, don't you?" The senility had vanished from his voice and eyes. "83,333 people equals one inch on that thing. You knew that, didn't you?"

"It's possible that - that might be true," replied Nancy. "But in my opinion, that isn't the right way to look at it."

He didn't ask her what the right way was…in her opinion. A thought was completed of his own, instead. "I'll tell you something else that's true: I'm Billy The Poet, and you're a very good looking woman." With one hand, he drew a snub-nosed revolver from his belt. With the other, He peeled off his bald dome and wrinkled forehead, which was made of rubber. He now showed his true age. He appeared to be about twenty-two.

"The police would very much like to know what I look like when this is all over," he said to Nancy. A malicious grin crossed his face. "In case you're not good at describing people, and it's surprising how many women aren't: I'm five-feet-two, with eyes of blue. With brown hair to my shoulders - a manly elf so full of self, the ladies say he smolders."

Billy was shorter than Nancy by about ten inches. She was forty pounds heavier as well.

"You don't stand a chance, dude," snapped Nancy. Nancy was mistaken. The poet unbolted the bars on the window, the night before. He then made Nancy climb out the window and then down the street and into a manhole that was hidden under the giant thermometer. He directed her through the sewers with the aid of a flashlight and map. Nancy was forced to walk along a narrow catwalk. Her own shadow was mockingly dancing along in the lead. She made an attempt to guess where they were in relation to the world above. Her third guess proved to be correct when they passed directly under a Howard Johnson's restaurant. Her correct guess was based on the familiar noises and smells from above. The restaurant designers provided sound effects and smells so people wouldn't feel lonesome when eating in the establishments. Nancy heard a clashing of silverware as provided by one of the recordings. One such recording provided the laughter of Negroes and Puerto Ricans who were supposed to - but previously worked the kitchens. After that, she was lost.

The poet had little to say to her other than turn right or left. He warned her, "Don't try anything funny or I'll blow your fucking head off." The only conversation, if one can call it that, was "What in the hell is a girl with hips like yours doing selling death." Billy asked her this while standing directly behind her lead and stop. She dared to stop. "I can answer that, " she responded. Her confidence swelled. She could give him an answer that would shrivel him like napalm.

He gave her a shove. He threatened to once again blow her head off. "You don't even want to hear my answer," Nancy taunted. "You're afraid to hear it."

"I never listen to a woman until the damned pills have worn off," sneered Billy.

His plan was to keep her a prisoner for at least eight hours. It took that long for them to wear off.

"That's a silly rule," laughed Nancy.

"A woman's not a woman till the pills wear off."

"You certainly manage to make a woman feel like an object rather than a person."

"You can thank the pills for that," replied Billy.

Eighty miles of sewers lie under Greater Hyannis. The municipality hosted a population of about 400,000 souls. A captive could easily loose track of time down there. The impersonator- Foxy Grandpa announced that they had reached their destination, Nancy thought…imagined the possibility of a year passing. She tested the spooky impression by pinching her own thigh for reassurance of what the chemical clock of her own body said, Nancy's thigh was still numb.

The captive female was ordered to climb iron rungs that were set in wet masonry. There was light from above. The moonlight filtered through the plastic polygons of a gigantic sparkling bubble…a geodesic dome. Nancy immediately knew where she was. There was only one place on Cape Cod, a dome like that existed. In Hyannis Port. It sheltered the ancient Kannady Compound. It was a museum that was now closed. It opened only during the summertime session. The duo crawled out of the sewer system manhole into an area where the Kannady lawn used to be. The expansive green cement, a replica, showed where the Kannady lawn had been. On the cement, in front of the ancient frame houses and statues stood. They were images of the fourteen Presidents of the United States…of the World. At the time of Nancy's abduction, the President of the World, by the way, was an ex-suicide hostess named 'Mabel Kannady.' Yeah, her name was Kannady, but she was not the real thing. The major complaint against her was lack of style. Folks found her vulgar. She had a big ass sign on her office wall, which read:

"You don't have to be crazy to work here, but it sure helps."

Another read:

"Thimk!"

While another flashed:

"Somebody we're going to have to get organized around here."

Her office was the 'Taj Mahal.'

Nancy was confident that she would get the chance, sooner or later, to break every bone in the body of Billy The Poet. She thought maybe she'd get the chance to shoot him with his own gun. She thought he was more disgusting than mosquitoes or blood sucking ticks. She thought she'd probably wouldn't mind doing those things when they arrived at the Kannady museum. Compassion didn't change her mind. She soon realized that Billy had a gang. There were more than eight people surrounding them after they crawled out of the hole. There where men and women of equal numbers. The women laid firm hands on Nancy. They told her to keep calm. One of them said, "Relax honey, you'll be fine." All of them were as tall as Nancy, The held her fast but gently. Albeit, they held her in places where they could hurt her. They could make it hurt like hell if they had to. Nancy thought to close her eyes. She hoped for protection from the obvious conclusion:

"These perverted women were sisters from the Ethical Suicide Service. Nancy was upset to the point where she asked loudly and bitterly, "How can you violate your oaths like this? She doubled up and burst into tears after being badly hurt by the well-placed grips. When she straightened up again, there was plenty more she wished to say, but wisely decided to keep her mouth shut. Speculating silently, what on Earth could make suicide hostesses turn against every known concept of human decency. Nancy remembered what her teachers had told her. A person numb from the waist down could and would copulate repeatedly and enthusiastically after drinking just one glass. She went over and over in her mind all the terribly awful drugs she'd learned about in school. She came to a conclusion and persuaded herself to believe that the female gang members had taken the worst drug of all. It had to be the answer - the women, and probably the men, too, had been drinking gin.

Nancy was rushed into the middle house on the property. It was dark like all the rest. She heard the men giving Billy news and updates. Nancy entertained a glimmer of hope. She hoped help might be on the way.

Two of the men told Billy the police didn't know that Nancy was missing. A telegram was sent to Mary Carmichael in Nancy's name. It stated that Nancy had been called to New York City on urgent family business. Apparently, the gang member who made the obscene telephone call to Nancy fooled the cops. The police believed they had finally nabbed the elusive poet. This proved to be bad news for Nancy, she knew better. She had another spark of hope knowing that Mary would not believe that telegram. Mary knew Nancy had no family in New York.

The gang cut through a lot of chains and ropes that were meant to keep people from touching things of value. They also deactivated the burglar-alarm system of the museum. There was no mystery in who or what it was that did the cutting. One of the guys was standing around holding a brutally looking pair of lopping shears. Nancy was herded into one of the servant's bedrooms upstairs. The dude with the shears cut the ropes that fenced off the narrow bed. Nancy was put into the bed and held down by two men while a woman with a hypodermic needle gave her a shot. A knockout shot. The poet disappeared.

The woman who gave Nancy the shot asked, "How old are you?"

Nancy was determined to not answer. But to no avail, she was powerless. She had to answer, "Sixty-three," she mumbled.

"How does it feel to be a sixty-three year old virgin?"

Nancy heard a voice in her state of fogginess. She couldn't believe it was hers. Sleepily, she replied, "Pointless." She spoke in a thick drug induced voice. "What was in the needle?"

"The stuff that was in the shot honey…was truth serum."

When Nancy woke up, the moon was down. The night was still there. The shades were drawn. There was a lit candle burning on the middle of the table, something that was never seen before. She'd never seen candlelight. Nancy dreamt of bees and mosquitoes. That was an odd dream, she thought. Birds, bees, and mosquitoes were extinct. She did dream of them. She dreamt of millions of insects and birds swarming all around her from the waist down. They didn't sting or bite. They simply fanned her. She was now a 'Popped Head.' She was no longer an 'Un-popped Head.' She was free and clean of the pills. She went to sleep again. When next she woke up, three women led her into a large bathroom. The women continued to wear stockings over their heads. The bathroom was filled with steam, as though prepared and used by someone else. Someone else's wet footprints crisscrossed the floor while the air was reeking and permeated with the scent of pine-needle perfume.

Nancy's will and intelligence returned. The drug has worn off or is nearly gone from her system after reaching its climax. As she bathed, perfumed, and dressed in a white silky nightgown, the women stepped back admire her. She quietly said with defiance, "I may be a 'Popped Head' now, but that doesn't mean I have to think or act like one.

No one argued with her point of view.

They took Nancy downstairs and right out of the house. She was expecting to be shoved down another manhole. She thought it would be a perfect setting for a violation, a violation by Billy - down in a sewer.

Then, they took her across the green cement, where the grass used to be. They crossed yellow cement where the beach used to be. They were next out on the blue cement, where the harbor and water used to be. There were twenty-eight foot yachts that once belonged to various members of the Kannady clan. Oh yeah, it's true…six twenty-eight foot yachts sunk up to their water lines in blue cement. The 'Marlin' was the most ancient of the lot. It once belonged to the head of the monarchy, Joseph Rhinegold Kannady. That was where Nancy was deposited.

Dawn rose over the high-rise apartment buildings surrounding the Kannady museum. It would be nearly an hour before direct light of the day would reach the microcosm under the geodesic dome.

Nancy was escorted up the gangplank all the way to the forward cabin of the 'Marlin.' She was to go down the steps of five…alone. She froze for a moment. The other women did too. Two statues stood at the wheel on the bridge. Once a 'Skipper' of the 'Marlin,' Frank S. Whalemen, and his son, Carlton, who stood next to him, was the first mate. They paid Nancy no attention. They were starring out through the windshield at blue cement.

Nancy was barefoot. She was wearing only a thin white silky nightgown. She descended with courage into the cabin. Candlelight formed a pool all around the cabin area of the vessel. Pine-needle perfume filled the air. The gangway hatch was closed and locked behind her. She was trapped - no way out.

Her emotions, like the antique furnishings of the cabin where complex. She had difficulty in defining the poet from his mahogany and leaded glass surroundings. She saw him at the far end of the cabin. His back was to the door. It blocked the door to the forward cockpit. Billy was wearing purple silk pajamas with a Russian collar. Piped in red, writhing across his silk covered breast was a dragon of gold. It was belching fire.

Billy was wearing glasses. Anti-climatically, he had a book. Nancy took a firm grip on the handholds of the gangway. She poised on the next-to-the-bottom step and bared her teeth. She calculated it would take about fifteen Billy-sized men to dislodge her from that spot.

A very large table was between them. Nancy envisioned a bed in a seraglio (a Muslim harem) or something soft and cushy, possibly in the shape of a swan to be utilized in the cabin. The cabin was actually about as voluptuous as a lower-middle class dinning room in Akron, Ohio, around 1910.

In the middle of the table a lit candle sat. There was an ice bucket and two glasses. A bottle of champagne was in the ice bucket. Champagne was as illegal as heroin or cocaine. Billy gave her a shy embarrassed smile. "Welcome," he said.

"This is as far as I come."

He accepted that. "You know, you're very beautiful there."

"And what am I supposed to say - that you're stunningly handsome and irresistible? That I'm feeling an overwhelming desire to throw myself into your manly arms?"

"If you wish to make me happy…that would certainly be one-way to do it." That was said in a humbling fashion.

"And what about my happiness?"

The poet seemed puzzled. "Why my dear, dear, Nancy - that's what this is all about."

"What if my idea of happiness doesn't coincide with yours?"

"My dear, and what do you think my idea of happiness is?"

"I'm not going to throw myself into your arms, or for that matter, anyone else's, and I'm not going to drink that poison either. I'm not going to budge from this spot unless somebody can make me," shouted Nancy. "So I'm thinking your idea of happiness is going to turn out to be about eighty people holding me down on that table, while you bravely hold a cocked pistol to my head - and do what you want. That's the way it's going to have to be. Now you gutless motherfucker - call your friends and get it over with!"

"Well, I see you've learned to speak the language. The pills have certainly worn off."

With a wave of his hand, that is exactly what the poet did.

He didn't hurt her. He deflowered her. He did it with a clinical skill. She found it ghastly. The poet didn't seem to be so cocky or proud after it was all over. He was actually depressed.

"Believe me, if there had been any other way…"

Nancy's reply was a face like stone, silence, and tears. The humiliation of this ghastly - grizzly act penetrated her very soul.

Billy's helpers let down a folding bed, which was hidden in a book-shelved wall. The bunk was barely wider than the shelves. It hung steadily and firmly by a linked chain attached to the wall behind the bookshelf. Nancy did not resist the gang putting her to bed in it. She was once again left alone with the poet. She felt like a big bass fiddle shoved onto a narrow shelf. After all, she is a fairly big woman. She wrapped an old scratchy war surplus blanket around her. She pulled the thing up in order to hide her face.

Nancy could sense what the poet was doing by the noises he made in the room. There weren't may sounds to be heard. Billy was sitting at the table. He was turning the pages of a book. He occasionally sighed and sniffed. The lit cigar, which protruded from his lips, stunk through Nancy's blanket. She loathingly starred at him through the blanket while he choked and coughed. This was caused when Billy inhaled the cigar smoke. He wasn't accustomed to smoking. He thought it might be debonair. An attempt at arousal - it didn't work. When he stopped, Nancy with venom in her voice, said, "It must be wonderful to be so manly. You are strong and healthy. You're also very masterful."

The poet simply sighed.

"I'm not your typical 'Un-Popped Head,' you know…I hated everything about living that life. It was dull, boring, and uneventful. I've always wanted to be a 'Popped Head'."

The poet turned another page of the book.

"I suppose all the other women couldn't get enough of it - simply adored it…and begged for more?"

"Nope."

Nancy uncovered her face. "What do you mean, 'nope'?"

"They've all been just like you."

Little did he realize, Nancy's buttons were pushed. She coldly stared at him and said, "What about the women who helped you tonight - what about them?"

"What about them?"

"Did you do to them what you did to me?"

"That's right." He never looked up from the book he was reading.

"Why didn't they kill you instead of helping you?"

"Because they understand…and they're quite grateful," he said in a calm voice.

Nancy got out of bed, and ran to the table, leaned in close to Billy and bitterly replied, "I am not grateful!"

"You will be."

"What in hell could bring about such a miracle?"

Billy answered, "Time."

He then closed his book and stood up. His magnetism confused Nancy. The poet was still in charge - somehow.

"My dear, what you've been through, is a typical wedding night for a straight-laced girl of a hundred years ago, when everybody was a "Popped Head." The groom was without helpers because the bride wasn't ready to kill him. The spirit of the occasion is still quite the same. I'm wearing the pajama's my Great-great-grandfather wore on his wedding night. According to his old diary, his bride cried all night long, and vomited more than once. But, the passage of time changed her into a sexual beast. She couldn't get enough."

Nancy said nothing. She understood completely. She was frightened to know how easily she understood. Gruesome beginnings allowed sexual activity with enthusiasm, to grow and grow.

"You are a very typical 'Popped Head' Nancy," said Billy. "Should you dare to think of it, you would realize that you are angry because I'm such a terrible lover, and a funny-looking shrimp of a man besides. And you will not be able to help dreaming about a suitable mate for a goddess such as you. You'll find him too. He'll be tall and strong. He'll be gentle and loving. The 'Popped Head Movement' is growing by leaps and bounds."

Nancy stopped herself from speaking. She blankly peered out one of the porthole windows. She starred at the rising sun.

"But, but what -?" Nancy said.

"The world is in the mess it is today because of the 'Popped Headiness' of olden times. Don't you see?" she pleaded meekly. "The world can't afford sex anymore."

"Of course it can," replied Billy. "All the world can't afford anymore is reproduction."

"Then why do we have the laws?"

"They're bad laws," said the poet. "If you go back through history, you'll find that people who have been most eager to rule, to make the laws, to enforce the laws ad to tell everybody exactly how God almighty wants things here on Earth - these people have forgiven themselves and their friends for anything and everything. But they have been absolutely disgusted and terrified by the natural sexuality of common men and women. Why this is, I do not know. That is one of the many questions I wish somebody would ask the machines. I do know this:

The triumph of that sort of disgust and terror is now complete. Almost every man and woman looks and feels like something the cat dragged in. The only sexual beauty that an ordinary human being can see today is in the woman who will kill him. Sex is death. There's a short and nasty equation for you: 'sex is death.' So you see, sweet Nancy, I have spent this time - this night, and many others like it attempting to restore a certain amount of innocent pleasure to the world, which is poorer in pleasure than it needs to be."

Nancy quietly sat down and bowed her head.

Billy continued to speak. "I'll tell you what my Grandfather did on the dawn or his wedding night."

I don't think I want to hear it."

"It isn't violent - it's meant to be tender."

"Maybe that's why I don't want to hear it."

"He read his bride a poem." The poet took the book from the table. He opened it. "His diary tells which poem it was. While we aren't bride and groom, and while we may not meet again for many years, I'd like to read this poem to you, to have you know I've loved you."

"Please - no…I couldn't stand it."

"All right, I'll leave the book here. I'll mark the place in case you want to read it later.

The poem begins:

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.

I love thee to the depth and breadth and height my soul can reach, when feeling out of sight for the ends of being and ideal grace."

The poet placed a small brown bottle on top of the book. "I am also leaving you these pills. If you take one a month, you will never have children. And still you'll be a Popped Head'." Then he left.

When Billy left, everyone left…all but Nancy. When she finally looked up and then at the book and little brown bottle, she saw the label.

The label read:

'Welcome to The Monkey House.'

Is sexuality a machine? What is it with mankind's love affair with total dependence upon computerized technology? Can one have sex with a machine? Would you want your sexuality - your life to be controlled by others? …by machines?

I wonder.

(Welcome to the Monkey House is an excellent read, an account of futuristic societal control - a warning if you will. It is in accord to many futuristic warnings including those written by this author).

Til next time…

Acknowledgements:

As Inspired by,

Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., "Welcome to the Monkey House," World's Best Science Fiction of 1969, edited by Wollheim and Carran an Ace Book, Copyright 1968

Inferno Operating System / All about Computer Operating Systems

http://ezinearticles.com/?Device-Machine-Dependent&id=1185378

http://www.morphosppc.com/article/device-machine-dependent

PC and Gadgets Guide

http://www.blogcatalog.com/blogs/pc-and-gadgets-guide

http://ezinearticles.com/?The-Legal-System-and-Technology-in-the-21st-Century&id=3970443

http://ezinearticles.com/?Comprehension-and-Communication---More-Than-Being-About-Technology&id=2478705

>
And:
Virginia M. Boulware, R. N.
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Yahoo:

http://search.yahoo.com/search;_ylt=Apf4ZU3AOnH2TQ6.gNYxUWqbvZx4?p=Gregory+V.+Boulware&toggle=1&cop=mss&ei=UTF-8&fr=fp-yie8

Google:

http://www.google.com/#hl=en&xhr=t&q=Gregory+V.+Boulware&cp=19&pf=p&sclient=psy&source=hp&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=Gregory+V.+Boulware&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.&fp=68b3f9ae28a95316&biw=844&bih=388

Bing:

http://www.bing.com/search?q=Gregory+V.+Boulware&qs=n&sk=&sc=1-19&form=QBLH

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http://www.associatedcontent.com/user/814056/gregory_boulware.html

http://ezinearticles.com/?expert_bio=Gregory_V._Boulware

http://www.blogger.com/profile/10910946197037982583

http://www.BoulwareEnterprises.wordpress.com

http://www.linkedin.com/pub/gregory-boulware/10/435/44b

http://www.BoulwareEnterprises.com

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Sex, Copulation, Machine, Robot, Humanity, Earth, Love, Life, Relationships, Rape, Fornication, Idolatry, Nature, Man, Woman, Futuristic.

http://thefoxygrandpabillythepoet.blogspot.com/2011/10/foxy-grandpa-billy-poet.html#!/2011/10/foxy-grandpa-billy-poet.html

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