"The
Cancerboy Dairies: Entry the 7th"
Poetry by Michael F. Nyiri
11/08/07 6:04 a.m. pst
One of the plot turns
on a popular television show
had a character diagnosed with the Big Casino
After four or five episodes, her hair fell out,
she became nauseous,
and bitchy,
and just in time for November sweeps,
her doctor gave her a welcome house call
and the news was upliftingly positive
As strains of hopeful and inspirational music played,
the doctor declared that all traces of the cancer
in her lymph nodes had gone
Smiles all around
Hesitant jubilation
and fade out
That was television
Veracity is only partially part of the script
and the doctor never warned, as in "real life"
that there is a good chance the Big C will return
and return
and return
The ballgame for you is not over yet
We've had the seventh inning stretch
and in the final moments of the eighth
the cancer and the chemo seem to be tied
We're about ready for the last inning
unless the game goes into overtime
Another year,
another round of chemotherapy
The hair grew back, only to begin to fall out again
We finally have been able to go out to dinner together
Only once, but we had a good time.
(I owed you dinner from a 12 year old bet you never collected)
(I didn't want the debt to go uncollected should cancer win!)
Well, on some occasions you feel better and can eat
but most of the time the treatments halt your appetite
much like the original "ball of cancer" stopped
the course of the food through your intestinal tract
in the first place
Was that four years ago?
You have now lived through this calamity
One year longer than the bleakest assessments
of your lifeline were given
You have now settled into "cancer complacency"
as you meet your weekly chemo buddies
(those who are still around)
every week at the clinic
Just last week the third round of therapies ended
The blood counts were negative in regards to the
presence of the disease
but the disease is not gone like on the television show
The disease has been slowed, but the growth will emerge
Undetected now, and soon to be detected
all over again
Nobody is writing your script
No late night reprise for your health
No mellifluous swelling of violin strings for you
Doc tells you that he's going to give you "a rest"
A rest from the debilitating destruction caused by the cure
which is not really a cure at all
but just a few more pages of the diary
encouraging you to live a little longer
before the final curtain falls and the book is closed forever
Enjoy your rest
Perhaps you will retain your appetite,
and we can go to dinner again (that was fun)
Perhaps you will have a little more joy this Christmas
but then again perhaps you will not
You never know
The pain of never knowing is the worst pain in the world
After your "rest" the chemotherapy will be administered
again.
Neither you nor I (nor the white coated medicos) know for certain
what the outcome will be
or what the t.o.d. will look like.
I, like a lot of seemingly healthy humanity,
know that the t.o.d. will come eventually for us all
But we don't have a disease with a variable alarm
like you and your fellow sufferers do
We feel good not knowing
And we hope that someday you will be able to
feel good again knowing something positive
God is writing your script, not some televsion scribe
And faith is all that any of us can muster
as we close another chapter in the diary
praying perhaps that a cure is discovered
at some point in your present life of suffering
Poetry
2007
