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The following can also be found in the book Chicago Stories 1997. Click here to learn more, and to download a free electronic copy.

I haven't told you this yet, but since I have you here, let me just tell you:
I wanna be your spleen.

I want be one of your weird, mysterious internal organs
one of those things that lies somewhere between here and here,
where exactly, we're not sure
I want to be inside you
and somehow be a vital part in your physical survival
without you knowing exactly why

I want to know that you would die without me
but that you don't know exactly how that would happen without me
only that it would

I wanna be your spleen,
not your lungs, no
and not your heart
or any of those other "famous" organs
that any decent fifth-grader knows all the ins and outs of

I don't want you to know the intimate details
of why you wouldn't survive without me --
"Well, you provide oxygen to my body,
and you aerate my red blood cells
which then course their way through my body,
spreading the precious oxygen to all needed parts."
No, I don't want to be that,
because if I was, then before you know it, you'll have figured out
how the organ is defective
and how to fix it
or God forbid, how to replace it
with a newer,
stronger,
better
one

I don't want to be replaced by a baboon heart
and left in some giant biotissue trash can
I don't want to be attached to a pacemaker
and have my movements, my actions regulated
by a plastic, battery-operated machine
No, I wanna be your small intestine, baby,
I wanna be your extra kidney,
I wanna be your spleen,
just this simple little nondescript organ of yours
that lets you live your life happily
that lets you explore the world in new ways
without you even knowing, realizing
that I am helping you

until, of course, I become inflamed

Copyright 1997, Jason Pettus. All rights reserved. This was published under a Creative Commons license; click here for details. Contact: ilikejason [at] gmail [dot] com.