Poem-a-Day

It all depends on the child’s arrival. 
If it arrives in what we call The Dawning 
Hours, you’ll have to ring the bell

for entrance. In this case, 
the Dawning Hours Business Office 
will contact you with a separate invoice

for the resources expended to release you 
from the infected world 
into the lobby where you will check in

with reception. If you arrive outside 
of The Dawning Hours, you will enter 
through the ground floor of the North Tower.

You will find your own way. 
If you reach the Medi-Spa for Patrons 
Near Death, you have gone too far

in one direction. If you reach the Sensory 
Deprivation Tanks for Life Resistant Arrivals™  
you’ve gone too far in the other.

If your convulsions are so powerful 
that you cannot walk, you can 
expect a bill

for anywhere between $50 and $12,000, 
depending on whether your small sea breaks 
in transit and stains the carpeting.

And Ma’am? If you don’t mind me 
saying so, you and your offspring 
are going to want to avoid any

version of a significant rupture
—a hemorrhage, a cord
prolapse, that kind of

thing—because while your 
assigned medical professional is 
in network there’s no telling

whether the Life-Saving Machinery™  
is in network and by “no telling” 
I mean they literally will not tell you

until you get your bill, assuming 
you live, otherwise your bill 
will go to your next

of kin, assuming your kin lives 
beyond the birth, and, what’s that, 
Ma’am? No. No, I don’t know

whether your plan covers Hereafter 
Care. Do you have an advanced
directive? I see. Yes, certainly, yes,

I’ll transfer you Higher Up.