Cautionary Fable of the 72 Virgins

Poor Joshua Belile. He isn’t the only one who tried writing a funny little story and found himself accused of malevolent and bigoted thoughts. You should see some of the rejection letters I got when I tried selling this:

There once lived a man named Mohammed Abdul
who grew up in a country barbaric and cruel.
He had no idea what a female looked like
since his culture demanded they stay out of sight.

Mohammed had nothing to fill up his days
but the five times he’d drop to his knees and then pray.
His God was his life, it was all that he had
save his anger, which hid the fact that he was sad

and lonely. A young man his age needs to date!
(If he’s busy with love, he’ll have less time to hate.)
Thus he grew up in a sad scary nation
where young men have nothing but prayers and frustration.

Mohammed’s whole future looked lonesome and dim
til the day when his God did appear unto him
and said: “There’s this building I want to blow up
but it seems that I do not have power enough

to destroy it. That is why I need your help.
First I want you to strap a few bombs to yourself,
then enter the building, and set the bombs off!”
Though Mohammed knew he would be foolish to scoff,

he said, “Gracious Allah, I don’t understand
why you must do your work through a mere mortal man.
You could send a storm in to knock it all down.
You’re the Lord God of All; why you need me around?”

Then Allah said, “That is a dumb thing to say
to the God to whom you always kneel down and pray;
I know you’re unhappy. I know that you doubt
that your life has a point. Well, I have a way out!

Just blow up the building, and after you die
I will take you to live with me up in the sky.”
Mohammed said, “That’s not a very good deal.
Can’t you offer me something that I’d want for real?”

So God said, “How’s this? If you give up your life
I’ll reward you by giving you six dozen wives.”
Mohammed said: “That gift of yours sounds obscene.
I despise women, since they’re all filth! And unclean!”

And Allah said, “Dearest Mohammed, I know
you have no first-hand knowledge of women, and so
the thought of a female makes you sick with dread—
you’re afraid she’ll discover you’re lousy in bed!

Here is the way to avoid your aversion—
the wives whom I give you will be clueless virgins!
All soft, quiet women with lovely dark eyes
who’ll obey you forever. How’s that for a prize?”

Mohammed considered the bleak life he faced;
then he thought of a Paradise that would be graced
by soft, quiet women who’d all let him do
any sad, inept sex-things he’d set his mind to.

That’s when he said, “All right, Allah, I’ll do it!”
It’s easy to die once you set your mind to it.
Mohammed strapped dynamite sticks to his waist
and knelt once more toward Mecca, to say one last grace

and went to the building God said he despised
and screamed “Allah akbar!” and blew it sky-high.
Mohammed felt pain for a short endless time
and blacked out for awhile, and then woke up to find

he stood next to Allah, who smiled and said,
“The best part of your life will come now that you’re dead!
Behold all the virgins I give unto you!
Count them all—it should come out to seventy-two.”

Mohammed looked eagerly out to his prize.
Sure enough, there were six dozen pairs of dark eyes
and yards of black cloth. But he saw nothing more
because each woman hid herself in a chador.

He tore off the veil of a woman close by
and then yelped in disgust at what greeted his eyes—
her whole face was covered with red warts and bumps
like a toad who had smallpox and then caught the mumps.

The end of her nose was too far from her face
and her louse-ridden hair stuck all over the place.
Her waist and her hips were too fleshy and thick;
had Mohammed a stomach, he would have been sick.

But since he was dead, with no stomach to hurl
he just turned his attention unto the next girl.
Egad! and Gadzooks! This one looked even worse!
Nearly ten times as hideous as did the first!

The next one looked worse! And the fourth one worse still!
Then he heard Allah laughing—so evil. So shrill.
He turned to face Allah and saw that he’d changed—
all his teeth had grown sharper, his smile deranged

two pointy-sharp horns grew from out of his head
and his eyes and his skin gleamed a bright shade of red.
“Mohammed,” said Allah, “you’re really a fool.
Since your last act on earth broke the cardinal rule

against killing folks who’d committed no crime,
you should know your reward will be less than sublime.
You killed all those people who’d done nothing wrong,
and then you think that you’ll go to Heaven? Come on!

Now, here’s what eternity will be for you:
you’ll have sex with these women, all seventy-two.
You’ll do them all once. Then you’ll do them again.
And continue to do them, until time might end.”

Mohammed protested, “I did it for you!
I said no, but you said that you wanted me to!”
“You only said ‘no’ til I said you’d get laid.
If you think with your dick you’ll be one, I’m afraid.”

At last, then, Mohammed could figure it out,
and he shrieked, “Now I realize what you’re all about!
You’re not God at all! No, not even a bit!
You are Iblis! The Devil! You’re Satan, that’s it!”

“And you did my bidding! Good job! Way to go!
You killed three hundred ninety-five people there, Mo!”
This made Satan laugh ’til he looked like he’d choke,
and then he disappeared in a puff of red smoke.

The virgins surrounded Mohammed as he
turned around in a panic and started to flee.
A few of them reached out, and ripped off his clothes,
and. . . well, you figure out where the rest of this goes.