April Metamorphosis

Dead Man Writing

April 1, 2019...or is it?

Just stumbled across this posthumous rewrite of Franz Kafka’s classic, tale The Metamorphosis more than 100 years after the publication of the original.  Kafka was generally dark and disturbing, but could not hold a candle to the depressing and ominous reality brought to you by Donald Chrump.  Thought you might enjoy the opening paragraphs of Kafka’s latest gem...

One morning, as Donald Chrump was waking up from anxious dreams and Twitter-based nightmares, he discovered that in bed he had been changed into a monstrous verminous bug. A casual observer would instantly recognize the improvement. He lay on his armour-hard back and saw, as he lifted his head up a little, his brown, arched abdomen divided up into rigid bow-like sections. Again, a considerable improvement from the doughy, gelatin-like mass that usually emerged from that part of his body. From this height the blanket, just about ready to slide off completely, could hardly stay in place. His numerous legs, which now outnumbered the “hairs” on his head, pitifully thin in comparison to the rest of his circumference, flickered helplessly before his eyes.

With apologies to cockroaches everywhere

 




‘What’s happened to me,’ he thought. It was no dream. His disgusting room, an improper room for a borderline human being, who in no way deserved the office he held, and drastically less gold-encrusted than his previous abode, which as he was wont to tell people every chance he got, was not nearly the “dump” he claimed it to be, despite the stench of stale hair spray, toxic tanning dye and the smell of the man himself – a smell it would later take a regiment of HAZMAT enrobed experts to eradicate. Above the table, on which an collection of half-eaten and still untouched fast food items was spread out (Chrump was a voracious pig, with no sense of taste or class) hung the picture set in a pretty gilt frame. It was a picture of a group of very young women fleeing and desperately trying to cover themselves, clearly distraught that someone or something was invading their privacy. He still cherished that picture, that moment, those young bodies who so reminded him of his precious daughter, of whom he dreamt most nights and almost as many days. What frightened him most at this moment, gazing once again at the body he no longer recognized? If he continued to look like this, would his daughter ever submit to his wishes? Would other women ever let him get away with grabbing them, as he had done so many times when he looked somewhat more human?

While one cannot help but be drawn to Kafka’s new rewrite and possibly relish the thought of it coming true, it seems to me that it is not so much Chrump, but America that has awakened to a drastic, terrifying, seemingly fatal transformation, a metamorphosis from a flawed, mighty nation, to a giant cockroach that horrifies and threatens not just itself, but its friends and neighbors, especially all those Mexican countries (according to Fux News) Chrump wants to shut down. 

I. Mangrey reporting in the nude.  Also, your shoe’s untied.