Read I Sing the Body Electric for Free Online Page B

you can fix it up. It’s had a raw deal so far, no reason for it to go on getting a raw deal. When will we tell Polly?”
    â€œTomorrow afternoon, when she wakes up.”
    Horn got up and walked to the table which was warmed by a soft illumination from overhead. The blue pyramid sat upon the table as Horn held out his hand.
    â€œHello, Baby,” said Horn.
    The blue pyramid looked up at Horn with three bright blue eyes. It shifted a tiny blue tendril, touching Horn’s fingers with it.
    Horn shivered.
    â€œHello, Baby.”
    The doctor produced a special feeding bottle.
    â€œThis is woman’s milk. Here we go.”
    Baby looked upward through clearing mists. Baby saw the shapes moving over him and knew them to be friendly. Baby was newborn, but already alert, strangely alert. Baby was aware.
    There were moving objects above and around Baby. Six cubes of a gray-white color, bending down. Six cubes with hexagonal appendages and three eyes to each cube. Then there were two other cubes coming from a distance over a crystalline plateau. One of the cubes was white. It had three eyes, too. There was something about this White Cube that Baby liked. There was an attraction. Some relation. There was an odor to the White Cube that reminded Baby of itself.
    Shrill sounds came from the six bending-down gray-white cubes. Sounds of curiosity and wonder. It was like a kind of piccolo music, all playing at once.
    Now the two newly arrived cubes, the White Cube and the Gray Cube, were whistling. After a while the White Cube extended one of its hexagonal appendages to touch Baby. Baby responded by putting out one of its tendrils from its pyramidal body. Baby liked the White Cube. Baby liked. Baby was hungry. Baby liked. Maybe the White Cube would give it food…
    The Gray Cube produced a pink globe for Baby. Baby was now to be fed. Good. Good. Baby accepted food eagerly.
    Food was good. All the gray-white cubes drifted away, leaving only the nice White Cube standing over Baby looking down and whistling over and over. Over and over.
    They told Polly the next day. Not everything. Just enough. Just a hint. They told her the baby was not well, in a certain way. They talked slowly, and in ever-tightening circles, in upon Polly. Then Dr. Wolcott gave a long lecture on the birth-mechanisms, how they helped a woman in her labor, and how, this time, they short-circuited. There was another man of scientific means present and he gave her a dry little talk on dimensions, holding up his fingers, so! one, two, three, and four. Still another man talked of energy and matter. Another spoke of underprivileged children.
    Polly finally sat up in bed and said, “What’s all the talk for? What’s wrong with my baby that you should all be talking so long?”
    Wolcott told her.
    â€œOf course, you can wait a week and see it,” he said. “Or you can sign over guardianship of the child to the Institute.”
    â€œThere’s only one thing I want to know,” said Polly.
    Dr. Wolcott raised his brows.
    â€œDid I make the child that way?” asked Polly.
    â€œYou most certainly did not! ”
    â€œThe child isn’t a monster, genetically?” asked Polly.
    â€œThe child was thrust into another continuum. Otherwise, it is perfectly normal.”
    Polly’s tight, lined mouth relaxed. She said, simply, “Then, bring me my baby. I want to see him. Please. Now.”
    They brought the “child.”
    The Horns left the hospital the next day. Polly walked out on her own two good legs, with Peter Horn following her, looking at her in quiet amazement.
    They did not have the baby with them. That would come later. Horn helped his wife into their helicopter and sat beside her. He lifted the ship, whirring, into the warm air.
    â€œYou’re a wonder,” he said.
    â€œAm I?” she said, lighting a cigarette.
    â€œYou are. You didn’t cry. You didn’t do