There once was a girl named Suzie
Whose boyfriend left for some floozy
It made her feel bad
And she got kind of mad
So she blew him away with an Uzi

According to Wikipedia, the punishment in hell for wrath is "being dismembered (probably over and over again, like the eagle that repeatedly eats Prometheus's liver every day in Greek mythology)."

            It was the "probably over and over again" that most interested me when I died and went to hell.   Wikipedia was right about the "probably".   The punishment for my wrath; for blowing my boyfriend away did occur over and over again as the online definition suggested.   I was relieved to discover that it was not for eternity as I had assumed.   I was dismembered only four times.   Compared to "for infinity" four times is a cakewalk.  

Dismemberment #1

            This was the easiest one of all.   I was so panicked with nerves that I actually passed out as they were tying each of my arms to a different horse set to run in opposite directions.   I felt the knot tighten on my left arm and suddenly realized I hadn't been breathing for at least the last minute and a half.   Just as I was about to take in a chest full of new air, iridescent silver stars floated over the scenery.   It was almost as if a school of those small and thin fish had swum up from the ground and created a barrier between me and what was about to happen to me.   They came and hid the two men in red plastic Halloween devil masks that tied knots in the rope around my wrists.   The fish hid the horses which looked so sickly and rundown, that I wondered if they had the strength to rip my arms off.   They hid the long hallway past my feet filled with red and orange cinderblocks.   They hid the flames of hell that rose up around me.   And to a small measure of my disappointment, the translucent and silvery stars blinded me forever from the little furry red man-beast, about three feet and four inches tall.   Though already red naturally, he wore a red nylon cape and black leather vest.   He jumped up and down, from one side of me to the next like a miniature poodle that wanted attention.  

            I passed out and was suddenly transfixed by a stalk of grilled asparagus and a giant cooked scallop wrapped in bacon.   Both were on a Styrofoam plate sitting in my lap.   I picked up the asparagus with my fingers and began to take the first bite from the thick and greasy base of the vegetable.   The asparagus was so tempting to me that I completely forgot for a time about my dismemberment.   I bit off the end of the asparagus and chewed slowly.   It was delicious.   I could hear laughter and conversation around me but I couldn't make out any of the words. When I looked up, it was as if I was looking at the world through a layer of wax paper or frosted glass.   I could barely make out the shapes but I knew something was there.   Something (a person???) in pink moved around in a dance or a demonstration in front of me.   I could hear more laughter and then next to me I heard my mother's voice say, "Try the scallop.   It's amazing with the bacon."   I heard more laughter - my uncle perhaps or possibly my seventh grade friend, Will.   I picked up the giant grilled scallop with both hands, the bacon now cooked into its flesh.   I bit into it and could feel the slight crunch of the bacon around the soft scallop.   How lucky was I!  

Dismemberment #2

            A prisoner from an Upstate NY jail stood in front of me with a big ax.   He wore a bright orange jumpsuit and a Mets cap.   His nose and his ear were both pierced. His eyes were warm; brown warm eyes.   I was already tied to a giant butchers block standing on end.   I was standing.   The inmate was standing.   I was tied to a block of wood and he was free as a bird wielding an ax.   The inmate laughed and looked around.   We were in the woods, presumably within a mile of the prison he came from.   We were surrounded by trees and butterflies.   Streaks of pale sunlight fell on to our faces and we were completely alone.

            "No one to hear me scream," I said and tried desperately to force a laugh.

            "You won't scream," he said and looked down.   He brought his hand to his mouth and covered it as if he was going to be sick, but instead he cried a little.   I saw a tear fall from his eye to his knuckle and then roll down the side of his hand to his wrist.   He looked back up at me and said finally, "it won't hurt."   He held the handle of the ax with both strong hands and pulled the ax as far behind him as he could before slamming it down as hard as he could where my arm met my shoulder.   My arm popped off like a plastic Mr. Potato Head toy.   It landed in the brush to my right.   I could see the dull silver of the bracelet my high school boyfriend had given me when he returned from a family trip to Mexico.   I hadn't taken it off in fifteen years.   New boyfriends came and went but that bracelet always stayed on my wrist.   It was a gift I never thought I wanted and I certainly never asked for but now I missed.   Now that it was on the wrist of my dismembered arm lying in the twigs and dried leaves of the forest floor, I needed it desperately.  

            The inmate was right.   There was no pain at all, though I felt the warmth of the blood covering my sides.   He wielded the ax again and again, chopping off my left arm, my right leg, my left leg and finally, my head.   The prisoner dropped his ax and ran like a fugitive from the law through the shadows of the trees.   The sun was setting and I lay in pieces in the middle of the woods.

Dismemberment #3

            Some kind of spaced out acid head in faded bell bottoms and a worn out pink t-shirt held my hand and led me through the hallways of a high school.   He whistled ridiculous tunes like the All in the Family song and Wanted Dead or Alive by Bon Jovi.   He walked me through the big empty high school.   The floors had been buffed and every third step or so, the space cadet would slide on his right foot and squeal.   The halls and classrooms were all empty; as if we had made it there the day before school began after a long summer.   The big empty silent city high school was the location of our adventure.   This acid-head and I were in it together.

            "Shhhhh!!!!" he screamed, let go of my hand and stretched both his arms out blocking me from going any further.   We had reached an intersection and I think we were on the second floor.  

            "Why are we stopping?" I whispered ever so quietly next to his ear.

            "What's the matter with you?? Keep your voice down!!" he screamed again and pulled me against the left wall of the hallway.   He ducked down and peered carefully around the corner. "It's all clear," he confirmed and grabbed my hand and pulled me around the corner.   Leading me toward a set of double doors he tip toed dramatically like a cartoon rabbit.   Just before we reached the double doors, he grabbed both my arms and flung me into a Foreign Language classroom.

            "Aren't you going to dismember me?" I asked as I sat down in the first row of seats.   The walls in this classroom were covered with posters offering phrases in Italian, Spanish, Russian and French.   A stack of I Claudius video-cassettes sat on a file cabinet in the corner.

            "We'll get to that," the man said and leafed through the papers in the top drawer of the teacher's desk.

            "What are you looking for?" I asked.

            The stoned hippie stopped and looked at the door to the classroom.   "Did you hear something?" he asked.   I shook my head.   He pulled out a box of chalk and emptied it on to the desk.   He chose a small blue piece from the pile and began to draw numbers on the blackboard - lots of numbers - tons of fucking numbers.   "Don't try to figure it out," he said, "it's way too complicated."   He continued drawing the numbers - rows and rows of numbers until the blackboard couldn't hold anymore of them.   Then, he simply erased the top row and filled it in with new numbers.   He had begun a never-ending cycle of writing numbers for no good reason.

            Bored, I got up from my desk and walked to the row of windows.   I looked out and saw a school bus pull up outside.   Sixteen and seventeen year olds poured out blabbing away.   School would begin soon.   I pulled an Italian book from the bookshelf under the windows and opened it up to page thirty-nine.   I read out loud the first thing I saw: "No me molesta."

Dismemberment #4

            "I'm innocent!   I'm innocent!   I'm innocent!" I yelled.   I knew it was a lie, although, for the life of me I couldn't remember what the hell I was guilty of.   Murder??   Was I a murderer??   "I'm innocent!   I'm innocent!   You have the wrong woman, I tell you.   I'm innocent!!"

            My head was being lowered into a guillotine.   I had a half second look at the heavy blade that was moments away from falling through my neck.   In front of me was a crowd or maybe even a mob of people with arms flailing around above their heads.

            "Kill her!" they shouted.   "Kill her and roast her!"  

            I couldn't help but feel flattered by the attention.   I had always had trouble getting more than ten or so people to my birthday parties.   This turnout now was incredible!!

            The executioner had granted me leniency for good behavior.   Just that morning, he had pulled me aside and told me the good news.

            "We will not dismember you," he explained, "until we behead you."   Both of us let out a long sigh of relief.   It had been plainly clear for the last month or so that the thought of dismembering me while my heart beat was weighing down heavily on both of us.   A week earlier, I had failed to sleep for three days in a row.   I had been up all night sweating and shaking at the thought of the executioner sawing off my arms and then my legs.   I got along with him.   He brought me books of poetry and novels.   I hesitate to say this, but I think we understood one another.   The night before my execution, while finally getting a good night's sleep, I awoke suddenly to the executioners screams.   I waited in the darkness of my room for him to say something, but he didn't.   Instead I heard him pace up and down the hallway for more than an hour.   The next morning - this morning - he gave me the good news.   After he gave me the good news, he said this to me:

            "I believe you are innocent.   Shout your innocence to the crowd.   Tell them you do not deserve to be beheaded."

            "I'm guilty," I said.

            "You are innocent."

            "No," I said, "I'm guilty." The executioner nodded and read me an entry from his boyhood diary.   I smiled as he read it to me.   My entries had been similar; our concerns when we were fourteen had been the same.

            Now, my head was firmly tied down under the big metal blade.   There was no returning from this one and I knew it.   This blade would end it all.   It would end the thought of it all; the existence of it all.   Dismemberment might have been better.   At least it would have been something.   At least I would have felt something.   The nothingness swallowed me suddenly.

            "I'm innocent!" I yelled knowing full well that I wasn't, but I looked out at the crowd and made them believe it.

There once was a girl named Suzie
Whose boyfriend left with some floozy
She didn't really care
So she washed her hair,
Then sat down, 'cause she felt somewhat woozy.