Seventeen Dead Boyfriends

Ah well, day forty-seven of the plague

Lost another boyfriend, huh, Lufa?

That's...how many is that now?

Seventeen

Well...

Do we even have any boys left in the...

Oh, well, Friedrich, of course
He's a little chubby, but, I suppose with the famine upon us
He'll lose some of his--

Now, Lufa, don't be so dramatic
Just because you've had seventeen dead boyfriends
Doesn't mean you get to lock yourself up in this room
And never go out again

I mean, I wouldn't advise you going any further than down the hall
Your sister Elsa's just started coughing
And we all know how that goes

But look at me!
I'm still smiling
I'm still perky

Your father died two minutes after vomiting up his own kidney
And I'm still getting up every morning
Getting dressed
Checking on your brothers to make sure their noses haven't fallen off yet

Life goes on, Lufa
Life marches on

Now, if I lost any of you children, that would be it
They'd have to bury me with you

...Assuming they buried any of us
The waiting list on a cemetery plot these days
Is up to six years

But losing a boyfriend
In the grand scheme of things
Isn't anything to obsess over

Now, losing seventeen boyfriends is, I admit
Worth getting a little bit down in the dumps about
But for Heaven's sake, Lufa, look at you
It's half past six in the morning
You're sitting here in front of your bedroom window
And you still don't have any make-up on!

What would the neighbors think
If they weren't all dead?

Darling, one day we will emerge from this plague
All of us will

And we'll all have a good laugh about it

About the disease
And the pestilience
And the men at the marketplace
Using their detached arms as backscratchers

Oh, we'll just laugh and laugh and laugh!

Hahahaha....ah...

Darling, these are dark times
Loss is a way of life
Women are having twelve children
In the hopes that at least half of them
Will make it to the age of ten

I myself was one of sixteen children
And I'm the only one still alive

...Well, if you don't count Gunther
But I wouldn't
Not that with that humpback
It's not like anybody would want him
Carrying on the family name

The point is, Lufa, we are all accustomed to hardships
This dead boyfriend, that boyfriend
One potato, two potato

No matter what
You have to keep living
You have to seize life
And never let it go!


...As long as you don't go outside
Or interact with anybody
Other than me

That's a dear

No more holing yourself up
In this room

It's a modern world now, Lufa
We all have to embrace it
And not cling to our old ways
By sheltering ourselves
And giving into superstition and fear

Now, if you'll excuse me
I have to go read the Bible to Elsa
Until the demon falls out of her genitals
So I can stick him with a fork blessed by a virgin
And watch him turn into a crow

It's going to be a long afternoon