Either nothing
or leukemia or nothing or
multiple myeloma or nothing
a tumor, the long needle, the shattered
bone, the blood cell count, the EKG, the EEG,
nothing, the cyst, the rash, the clot, the scream, the sigh,
the “let’s just be sure,” the “let’s rule it out,” the “this may pinch
Your death seared my cells,
fired them with you;
in one way, you left
me as your body slipped
from mine, 41 years ago,
but in another way, you
entered me;
Like a rose
The nurse says
Of this new, unexpected opening into my body,
Fastening the pouch with expert hands
Deep red
Inside out
My hands tremble as I empty my
lunch of meatloaf and mashed potatoes
Rendered brown murky liquid
Into the toilet.
Everyone is nice to me. First night
through morphine I hear nurses saying
they’ll keep me on the surgical floor,
refuse to send me to the cancer unit.
They know I’m healthy, rich with lifeblood–
why view the damage this disease could do?
She did not slice the bandage snugged about the numb toe
but tickled an end open to begin the unwinding. She
unwound the gauze slowly as she turned her head
to see where the cloth stuck to itself and how to cut it.
Vit
il
I go.
I loved quilts until I became one.
the most terrible pain known to man,
trigeminal neuralgia
ricochets around my face, pulsing
electric-shocks. My doctor advises
cutting the nerve in my cheek, the only hope
of stopping the torture. He mentions
some patients consider
suicide. My husband has just revealed
In early morning appointments,
the doctor’s coat reeks of cigarettes
as he moves closer,
says “Scoot down,”
inserts the probe.
They want me to want my eggs
in case the treatment takes them—
to hold fast to the dream of a child
with my dimples and dark eyes.
In the springtime, a zombie showed up,
breaking down our door and biting me.
Friends and neighbors asked questions,
not daring to come near,
leaving flowers, candles, baked goods
on our crooked stoop.
Small birds teeter
on the wires by the feedstore.
Crows scatter broken seedpods
beneath the streetlight.
Flowering weeds crowd the dusty sidewalk,
sickly yellow or red as blood.
She’d moved west to Seattle; by phone
we compare treatments, numbers,
chances.
Hanging on, she says: we are survivors.
Occasionally it sounds like
a cathedral tower full of bells
but usually it’s more like the last
scatter of cicadas at the end of summer,
an almost pleasant buzz and whirr,
