This was Malaysia not Amazonia
and our guide hadn’t warned us
of any fish until one of our coeds
screamed bloody murder and lifted
from the lake a tipless toe gushing
crimson, and I thought, as I held
a first-aid kit for my colleague
at the foot of the victim, of our boys
skinny-dipping in the lake an hour
before the girls had waded in.
How would we have bandaged
a suddenly circumcised lad
and explain him to his parents?
