I woke up in the morning with sadness biting greedily of me. I ripped my right arm off and threw it after it. I missed it. Then I took my eyes out, one kidney, the liver, the heart. I strung them up on the clothesline from the back of the house, to shake off the blackness. Not much time passed and the wind blew them away. The left arm tried to pick them up, running wildly on wobbly legs. From the yard next door, the Science was lurking. She was only interested in 21 grams of me. She had no idea I had long ago exchanged them for a chimera.
Radu Gramatovici
The smell of charcuterie hit you from the moment you stepped into the Edible Art Room. People were crowding around Dali's famous melting clocks, now made of slices of baloney and placed on rolls stuffed with the same cold meat. The artist walked around with a plate, shouting at times: grab, taste the experience of time. When he came near me, he whispered to me conspiratorially: this is how human life is consumed. I felt the need to agree: what a metaphor full of taste. But he looked at me intrigued and hastily corrected me: no, no. Literally.
Marius Stan
I found out it was something charitable, for others' welfare. I fought with this concept associated with generosity. It is hard to accept that others' own welfare is above mine. But, whatever, I donate the body to science. And what do I get in return? Nothing. That nothing which I despise. Zero. Nada. It is my body after all, flesh and bones and nerves, especially nerves. How can I give it for free? For what? For science? For those nerds who scraped their elbows on the faculty desks? I better donate my body to a church. In order to forgive me.
(Translated by Irina Vild / University of Bucharest, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, MTTLC, year I / Corrected by Silvia Petrescu, coordinator of the translations)
Versiunea în română a acestui text se poate citi aici, în rubrica Ficțiuni Reale.