Amputation

“You‘ve got to amputate my arm.”
“What for?” The Doctor cried.
“It’s done too much disgusting harm
Than I would dare to pride.

It held a knife up to the throat
Of my beloved friend;
It sunk my questing lover’s boat
There by the river’s end.”

“You are a murderer!” “Oh no,
I never do partake.
My wretched arm is but a tool —
The Reaper’s lethal rake.

It’s never me, I don’t condone
Such cruelty at all!
Oh Doctor, saw right through the bone
And let the damn thing fall!”

The Doctor paused and looked me up
And down and up again
“Peculiar! Let me set up;
We’ll be proceeding then.”

He wrung and wrestled, drilled and cut,
Then in one final swing
Into a swirling pool of blood
He dropped the vicious thing.

And as the crawling, clawing hand
Was scampering away
The Doctor, with no further plan,
Inquired in dismay:

“Whatever should we do with it?”
“I say just let it go:
Don’t mind the throats that it will slit —
For all that we both know

I’d be no longer put to blame
For any of its crimes:
It’s but some flesh — bears not my name,
And therefore — it’s just fine!”

I walked away, pure as a child
Baptized and promptly hymned:
My soul and image undefiled
By a contentious limb.