Trust: A Novel Part 28

OWED TO THE PLACEBO.

("Ho ho," said Mrs. Karp. "Tell them how it's spelled! O-w-e-d, not o-d-e. And don't go calling it doggerel, William-it's too frisky. If you must, call it pupperel. Ho ho, ho ho.") And I said into the air what I saw:

All hail to the placebo,

The mild, delightful, effective placebo!

Sing hoo, sing ray,

Sing night, sing day,

Sing while sitting in the latticed gazebo,

Sing while with alpenstock upon Mount Nebo;

Laurels and praise to the wondrous placebo!

Though the placebo is a pill

For the not-so-ill,

It must never occasion your mirth.

Small is its girth

Yet what on earth

From desert to firth

Can boast the worth

Of this radiant pill

For the not-so-ill?

This homely, familiar, not in the least exotic

Device for the not-very-sick-but-somewhat-neurotic-

("Did your mother's hair really fall out? All of it?" Euphoria, though enraptured, allowed herself to break in.

"A lot of it did," I answered.

"Poor woman! Suffering from one of the ills that mortals fall hair to. Ho ho!" said Euphoria. "Don't stop, don't stop. There's more to read. Ho ho!") I read grimly on.

There are pills which are drugs which have plenty of power

But when you eat them, alas, their taste is sour,

They give you a frown and a scowl and a glower.

But the sweet placebo makes n.o.body cower!

Of invisible strength it's a veritable tower!

How sly the placebo, how subtly deceiving:

It only pretends, but succeeds, in relieving,

For its recondite force, whether medical or dental,

Lies just in this fact: that it's nothing but mental.

If we hadn't the placebo for the hypochondriacal

The whole world would soon go quickly maniacal!

So you patients who are found to be fit as a fiddle,

You patients whose ailment's an insoluble riddle,