What Ensued After Tom ('The Baffler') Frank Cut His Cock Off and Embraced 'Dickless Living'

"Across the river Brock could see lights, layer after layer, crookedly ascending, thickly crowded dwellings, heaped one on the other. In the smoking torch- and firelight he saw people dancing. An old woman and an old man approached. The man carried objects in his hand that Brock couldn't make out clearly. Then he began to notice, all around in the gloom, bones, human bones, skulls and skeletons. 'What is it?' he asked. 'Please.' ¶ 'They'll take our your bones,' Vato explained. 'The bones have to stay on this side. The rest of you goes over. You look a lot different, and you move funny for a while, but they say you'll adjust. Give these third-worlders a chance, you know, they can be a lotta fun.' ¶ 'So long, Brock,' said Blood."

—from Thomas Pynchon's novel, "Vineland" (1990)