Portnoy’s Complaint

"That there are women who are homosexual persons." "Come on," grumbles Poppa Bear, "what kind of garbage is that, what kind of crap is that-?" "Jack, please. I'm not making it up. I read it in Cosmo! I'll show you the article!" "Come on, they print that stuff for the circulation- " Momma! Poppa! There is worse even than that- there are people who fuck chickens! There are men who screw stiffs! You simply cannot imagine how some people will respond to having served fifteen- and twenty-year sentences as some crazy bastard's idea of "good"! So if I kicked you in the shins, Ma-ma, if I sunk my teeth into your wrist clear through to the bone, count your blessings! For had I kept it all inside me, believe me, you too might have arrived home to find a pimply adolescent corpse swinging over the bathtub by his father's belt. Worse yet, this last summer, instead of sitting shiva over a son running off to faraway Europe, you might have found yourself dining out on my "deck" on Fire Island-the two of you, me, and Sheldon. And if you remember what that goyische lobster did to your kishkas, imagine what it would have been like trying to keep down Shelly's sauce béarnaise.

So there.

…

What a pantomime I had to perform to get my zylon windbreaker off my back and into my lap so as to cover my joint that night I bared it to the elements. All for the benefit of the driver, within whose Polack power it lay merely to flip on the overhead lights and thus destroy in a single moment fifteen years of neat notebooks and good grades and teeth-cleaning twice a day and never eating a piece of fruit without thoroughly washing it beforehand… Is it hot in here! Whew, is it hot! Boy oh boy, I guess I just better get this jacket off and put it right down here in a neat little pile in my lap… Only what am I doing? A Polack's day, my father has suggested to me, isn't complete until he has dragged his big dumb feet across the bones of a Jew. Why am I taking this chance in front of my worst enemy? What will become of me if I'm caught!

Half the length of the tunnel it takes me to unzip my zipper silently-and there it is again, up it pops again, as always swollen, bursting with demands, like some idiot macrocephalic making his parents' life a misery with his simpleton's insatiable needs.

"Jerk me off," I am told by the silky monster. "Here? Now?" "Of course here and now. When would you expect an opportunity like this to present itself a second time? Don't you know what that girl is who is asleep beside you? Just look at that nose." "What nose?" "That's the point-it's hardly even there. Look at that hair, like off a spinning wheel. Remember 'flax' that you studied in school? That's human flax! Schmuck, this is the real McCoy. A shikse! And asleep! Or maybe she's just faking it is a strong possibility too. Faking it, but saying under her breath, 'Cmon, Big Boy, do all the different dirty things to me you ever wanted to do.’' " "Could that be so?" "Darling," croons my cock, "let me just begin to list the many different dirty things she would like you to start off with: she wants you to take her hard little shikse titties in your hands, for one." "She does?" "She wants you to finger-fuck her shikse cunt till she faints." "Oh God. Till she faints!" "This is an opportunity such as may never occur again. So long as you live." "Ah, but that's the point, how long is that likely to be? The driver's name is all X's and Y's-if my father is right, these Polish people are direct descendants from the ox!"

But who wins an argument with a hard-on? Ven der putz shteht, Ugt der sechel in drerd. Know that famous proverb? When the prick stands up, the brains get buried in the ground! When the prick stands up, the brains are as good as dead! And 'tis so! Up it jumps, a dog through a hoop, right into the bracelet of middle finger, index finger, and thumb that I have provided for the occasion. A three-finger hand-job with staccato half-inch strokes up from the base-this will be best for a bus, this will (hopefully) cause my zylon jacket to do a minimal amount of hopping and jumping around. To be sure, such a technique means forgoing the sensitive tip, but that much of life is sacrifice and self-control is a fact that even a sex fiend cannot afford to be blind to.