I add another ball of surgical tape to the back of the photograph of my family hanging at foot of my bed.
Don’t fall.
Stay there.
Just stay.
Together.
…………………….
I wake up fettered, chained, restrained in body and mind.
The room is cold and yet it stifles:
Choking, pulling, grabbing me back, reeling me in.
I start to shake, fear manifest in movement,
Waiting for Reality,
The next interloper…
Another who will not be pushed away,
Ignored,
Wished or willed or
Bargained for.
I search for powers to rise above, get out, fly away.
Those dreams cannot escape that reality.
That shaking cannot stop.
When repeatedly pushing the button of narcotics is an act of acceptance,
A realization of what is,
In part an impotent attempt to eject myself from the room, the bed, my body.
The tears which accompany my pathetic try stay safely tucked away,
Hiding with hope and mental acuity and certainty.
Like middle school children the fear starts to divide, partners off, chooses a companion for the evening.
Two by two, hands on hips, turning tightly into a circle
Guarding spots of possession,
Declaring ownership,
This is mine.
The fetters must remain and yet I will not budge.
I have my spot.
Small perhaps,
But it is still mine.
I have my life.
I watch it shrink.
I have my words.
But now I see them dissolve around the edges
Like watercolors they bleed as they search for pristine lands to conquer
As they stretch that lifeline.
The words of disease become words my brain gravitates to.
The ebb and flow of cancer,
Of life.
And so too,
Inevitably,
Of death.
Each night when I return to my room after radiation now it happens:
My voice instantly is quiet, reverent.
I am resepectful of what I ask that beam to do,
I ponder the magnitude of something I cannot see.
And so I affix that photograph, one more piece of tape just in case.
Holding on to all that matters,
Doing as much as I can for as long as I can.
Day by day,
Storing up bits of beauty wherever I can find them.
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