Cucurbitadectomy Maxima

Utensils were laid out, the drop cloth on the floor,

The subject on the table had been prepped for surgery

My students anxious to watch their first cranial opening

Incision lines already marked on the head by these talented young residents

With rote familiarity and a forceful hand, I inserted the blade and slid it out, inserted and slid it out, inserted and pulled it out again, cutting around the crown

Rudimentary? Even barbaric? Perhaps…Well, yes, even for a great surgeon of my long experience

After all, my first performed procedure was in my tenth year

But no worries—he was dead already— his preserved head long since plucked from his viny form

I pried the skull cap and it slowly rose with a sound of vacuum sealed suction and there was bated breath hovering over my shoulders

I removed it and without regard for life that once was, I plopped it in the pan

My interns crowded around and filled the subject’s void with their curiosity and awe over this man’s once alive orange matter

“Go ahead,” I said. “Reach in and feel what “brains” feel like! Grab a handful and squeeeeeze. That’s it, let the goo squish through your fingers! Now pull it out and slap those noodles and brain seeds on the table.”

“Gross!!” They shouted.

“Isn’t this fun?” I rhetorically asked, consumed by my own knife wielding, macabre pumpkin lust