The Ice Cube

There is a water glass with an ice cube in it. The glass sweats. The ice cube turns, goddammit, protesting the horror of becoming warm water. This cube, conceived in the cold Lake, was born as cold water through Mother Tap's vagina. "Push, push," Dr. Pipe said.

After hours of carefully practiced indifference, the infant cube expanded into proud, hard ice. It learned not to talk to its tray-mates, except to exchange a snide remark about those warmies, always tea baggin' each other and fouling the air with their steam.

The ever-shrinking cube would rather evaporate than become warm water. It turns, not screaming, not saying a word, as each ugly little bubble settles into the imperfections of the glass and its ego. Now it is gone. It has become a warmie, down the drain, perhaps never to be ice again.