Clonic and Tonic,

aka The Bonker Brothers,

in the Colonel’s Colon

-Dr. Weaver

“It makes me sick to watch them eat like that. Every minute of their day is filled with luxury and splendor. They have it all and they want more. Look at them stuffing their faces. And all the while you and I have only kerosene tabs to lick”

“You’ve said a mouthful, and for once I agree with you, brother. How grotesque is their excess! And to top it off, they talk about their gluttonous feasts as one talks of art”

“Yea, after cramming their cakeholes, they sit back, unbuckle their belts, and over intellectualize their chow”

“It’s like their icing on the cake”

“More like icing on the icing”

“More like icing on the icing on the icing”

“Digesting their desserts while wasting words”

The two Bonker Brothers’ rant against the “farm-to-mouth” eating disorder that afflicts affluents must be taken with a grain of salt. From where I stand, I see a little drool streaming off their lower lips. Their valid argument is a bit spoiled by their apparent envy and disappointment from being “left out the club”. The moral often harbor in their deep waters a wish to enlist with us libertines.

The twin Bonker Brothers, Clonic and Tonic, are as moral as they come, partly in rebellion against their wicked ancestors. They’ve struggled to live clean and honest their entire lives. They’ve succeeded, but without reward. One finds it hard to climb the snakes and ladders of society without telling dirty lies, white or pathological.

From where I stand, I see a little drool streaming from my lips and forming a pool at my feet. I am salivating at the thought of the Bonker Brothers in my stomach. I am stuffed already from my double dinner, but I can’t resist popping the two Bonkers into my mouth and down the hatch.

They swim around in there for awhile. I holler down my own throat at them, “You boys doing alright in there?”

No answer.

“They must be feeding on my chews down there,” I think to myself.

“Yes, we must, must we,” Clonic thinks to myself.

Uh-oh. The Bonkers have linked up with my thought streams.

“Babble babble babble” The Bonkers think to myself a load of nonsense.

excerpt (overlapping swashes and vertical rippling):

“Babble babble babble I’m a bubbling brook”

“Babble babble babble I’m a bather in a bubble”

“I’m a swan prince…a suave swimmer”

“I never learned to swim”

“Why’s that, Tonic?”

“I guess I just don’t have the stomach for it”

“Really you don’t?”

“Really. I try and try, but I always seem to belly flop”

“Ah, you could do it if you got to it. You might not have the stomach, but I know you’ve got the guts. It’s as easy as aerodynamics”

“How do you mean?”

“You know…StoMach 2…StoMach 3…StoMach 4….StoMah-“

“Stop! Stop! You’re making me dizzy! You talk too fast. I feel sick! I’m gagging!”

“Consider it an early Birthday present then”

“Consider what?”

“My gift, from me to you”

“What gift?”

“The gag gift, of course”

“Please take your ‘gift of gag’ back, please. I’m gagging and vomiting everywhere as I speak”

“Bah! Okay, but you’re no fundus”

“Thanks. Sheesh, Clonic, you’ve got a bad tract record when it comes to gifts”

“I think my gifts are thoughtful”

“They’re a stomachful, is what they are”

“You said a mouthful”

“You fool”

“No, I’m starved”

“No. I said, ‘you fool’”

“No, I’m food”

“You and me both. Looks like the Colonel’s done it to us again. We’ll just have to wait it out”

“Bolus! I’m not waiting around this time. I’m gonna find a way to bypass this process”

“Why? I love it in here. It’s like a day trip to the water park. Riding the peristaltic waves. I think it’s a gas!”

“I used to agree with you, but the whole routine is getting old”

“The Colonel does pop us in quite a bit”

“I wish we’d have the good fortune to pop into a lungfish for a change of pace”

“Or a lamprey”

“Or a monotreme”

“Or one of those types that ‘shits where he eats’”

“It could be worse”

“How?”

“We could be in one of them stomachs with four compartments”

“True! If I was inside one of those, then I’d really have a cow”

“Well, it’s no use ruminating on our fate. It’s best to accept the stomach one is dealt. Me, I’m going to savor this little trip through the tubes. I’m going to milk it for all it’s worth”

“Bovine for you, but I’m outta here…. This is bull”

“Do you mind if I chyme in and tell you that you sound a little pessimistic?”

“More like dyspeptic!”

“I can see that you’re in need of dis pep talk, then”

“Don’t be so distensible”

“No really! A little pep in your step and you’ll gain omentum in no time”

“You’re omental, Brother”

“No, you and I are just different. I see the light at the end of the tunnel. And in the meantime, I’m a-gonna relax on the veranda at the Colonel’s Villi”

“Yea, you’re omental alright, kooky Clonic. A Police Ulcer oughta read you your Veranda Rights then lock you away”

“But I’m no villi-an”

“Yea, you’re worse…you’re a parasite!”

“That’s not true! I haven’t seen a thing, let alone in pairs, since we popped down here into tubby’s dark tummy”

“Look, bottom line is you’re a bore…a borborygmus”

“That’s inflammatory! All you do is insult me and grumble… insult me and grumble”

“Sounds like you want to rumble”

“Don’t tempt me. I’ll chew you up”

“Ah-ha! Look who’s irritable now!”

“How can I help it? You’ve been grinding me down. Your cancerous clucking is gastronomical”

“Mr. Happy Harry, it’s on. Up against the gastrointestinal wall, mother fucker, this is a stink up!”

“Ok. We’ll rumble and we’ll tumble. But before we begin, let’s take a bowel”

“Babble babble babble” -how two little Bonker fellas manage to make such a meaningless thought racket beats me. I was getting a little tired of their routine-being in my thoughts and being in my stomach. They used to be good, fresh little boys, but now they’d gone sour.

Maybe I was to blame. After all, I was always popping them in and pooping them out. Guess the poor little Bonkers were all used up. They were starting to sound a lot like me: the Colonel: their Father.

Quit playing the blame game, I scolded myself. The past is the past. The problem now is that they are both a little…off…like rotten kipper, and they’re sloshing around in my happy healthful hungry tumtum. I’ll have to take action lest I get all sick in the head like them and start spouting off senseless punplays on words that always miss the mark.

I shoved my fingers down my throat and upchucked the whole shebang, my double dinners and Bonkers and all, right into the can, and flushed.

Now that’s more like it, I thought, relieved. The Sewer Snake* ought to take care of them with his cloacal kiss of death.

*see BREAK-OUT, March 2014, for more on the Sewer Snake. -editor’s note