KIDNEY VAKKAM



You want a freshly thatched roof, Balan?
A bicycle, a handcart, a brick wall for your hut?
Then you give me your kidney.
No, listen.  I give you thirty thousand rupees.
Do not worry, please.  If there is internal bleeding,
I will sell litres of the stuff.  Like the juice of nipa-fruits.
All for your daughter’s dowry.
But Villivakkam people are proud of their scars.
The men lift their shirts high.
The women adjust the tops of their saris,
swivelling so gracefully to show off their caste.
Ho yes, I know the scars run for thirty centimetres
around the left side from the waist up the back.
I am not a body-broker for nothing, isn’t it.
Okay, so you can buy patches of skin
to heal the scar at one thousand rupees per patch.
That will come to no more than five thousand.
Holy cow!  You would rather die?
Then permit me to sell your corpse.  Three thousand the lot.
It looks in damn reasonable condition, considering.
My cut?  Only twenty per cent for you, my friend.
On the contrary, that is standard practice.
I have to bargain with sick people, you know.
But if you wish to see so-fine luxury,
Then give me one of your eyes.  Whichever one you like. 
A live cornea fetches four thousand dollars in Madras.
Eight thousand the pair.  You will be twice damn lucky, isn’t it.
Balan, my friend, you only need one eye.

                                                                                                Michael Small
                                    August, 1991
                                   
                                    published Centoria, no 4, April, 1998, Victoria, AUSTRALIA

                                    published The Mozzie, vol 13, issue 9, 2005

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