Ken still lies bleeding on the floor, large rips still marring his smooth skin, his finger still firmly planted in his nose. I know you had hoped there would be a change in his condition, but as you can see there has been none. It has been thirteen years. The prognosis is not good.

I remember when your shelves held dozens of Kens, each in a different position--the Laughing Ken, the Sleeping Ken, the Climbing Ken, the Two-Faced Ken, the Grimacing Ken. You were fascinated by the possibilities. Hours would pass as you thought up new poses, created scenarios involving troupes of Kens, rearranged the Kens into circles, arrays, hierarchies, dictatorships.

But Kens did not eat or shit, nor did they love or hate, nor did they hurt. They could be directed to eat and shit, if only crudely, by your hand, but you secretly hoped they really could hurt, that if you embarrassed them or disfigured them enough that they really would feel, that you might one day find yourself immolated in the psychically outflung anger of a myriad Kens, all of them immobile, but killing you nevertheless. You hoped.

Unfortunately, it didn't work. All the pools of fake Ken blood, all the enlarged Ken nostrils, all the knifings and lancings and scissorings of Ken flesh could not create one iota of emotion, and now your bedroom is just a mess--and has been, for thirteen years.