This one is about a round baby, actually
more of a wheel shaped baby.
"Ideas go only so far."
"Last year, I made up a baby.
I made her in the shape of a hat box or a cake.
I could have iced her and no one would have been the wiser.
You know how trained elephants will step onto a little round
platform, cramming all four fat feet together?
That's her too, and the fez on the elephant's head.
[LAUGHTER]
Applause all around, there is no denying I've made a good baby.
[LAUGHTER]
I gave her a sweet face, a pair of pretty eyes,
and a secret trait at her christening.
I sent her on my desk face up and waited.
I watched her like a clock.
I didn't coo at her though.
She wasn't that kind of baby.
She never got any bigger, but she did learn to roll.
Her little flat face went round and round.
On her other side, her not face rolled round and round too.
[LAUGHTER]
She followed me everywhere.
When I swam, she floated in the swimming pool, a platter
for the sun.
When I read, she was my peacefully blinking footstool.
She fit so perfectly into the washing machine
that perhaps I washed her more than necessary.
[LAUGHTER]
And it was wonderful to watch her eyes slitted
against the suds, a stray red sock swishing about her face
like the tongue of some large animal.
When you make up a good baby, other people will want one too.
Who's to say that I'm the only one who deserves it,
dear little machine washable ever so presentable baby?
Not me.
So I made a batch, but they weren't exactly like her.
They were smaller and without any inborn dread.
Sometimes I see one rolling past my window at sunset, quite
unlike my baby, who like any good idea,
eventually ended up dead."
[LAUGHTER]