#cancer poems on Hello Poetry

3d

The Club

He did not want to join the club.
He never did apply.
When he learned about his membership,
his impulse was to cry.

With his membership came tests and fees.
The doctors bled him dry.
There were biopsies and M.R.I's
Why me, he wondered, Why?

It seems his White blood cell count was up
while his platelet count was down.
He asked if there was any hope
but the White Coats merely frowned.

This club need not advertise
for fear that membership will drop.
New members join up every day
though all would rather not.

My best friend from college is battling Lymphoma and hoping for remission

#cancer

3d

a poem for pink friday

let me talk about pink
she's seductive and sweet like sugar cookies
wild and free than the flowers growing over the meadow
loving and proud like the cherry blossom trees that stand tall
beautiful but deadly like the rose and her thorns
she's energetic, she's loud
she's silent, she's artistic
but know she will always be strong
stronger than the illness she's connected to
stronger than the world
stronger than every hateful or heart breaking word that hits her
sometimes she might fall
sometimes she will tumble
sometimes she will collapse and cry for a while
but she will rise again
like the sun always does in the morning
and the moon in the evening
she will become strong again
and will never give up

#cancer #pink #love #beauty #strong

5d

Sunflower Susan

Sunflower Susan, you're a ray of kindness.
You help everyone, but your petals are wilting;
your yellow glow is fading and your stem is leaning.
Your campaign to help is now halting.

Sunflower Susan, grandmother, sister, aunt, mother,
you're falling apart now and it's hard for us all.

I feel angry. Saddened. Shocked.
Could this be history repeating itself? Cancer
rearing its **** head to take another?
Sunflower Susan, you will keep growing.
You will keep strong, your stem never breaking.
Sunflower Susan, I have hope and faith that you
will survive. Sunflower Susan, please survive.

my aunt, whom i'm very close to, got diagnosed with cancer and it's all really hazy and upsetting. i have faith she'll fight it, though, i have faith and i have faith until i have nothing.

#flowers #hope #pain #cancer #grief #emotions #metaphor #light #dark

5d

Die Later

Fear terror
Tears sobs
Despair surrender

Screeching to life
Circling  around
Killing its prey
Lying defenseless

Spitting fire
Jaw of tungsten
Gnashing teeth
Shaping death
LINAC LINAC
Sear my flesh

Life is a sacrifice
Pay the price
Tribute is due
Die later

Plea to the priest
Spare me, please
No redemption
Appeasement only

Vitality taken
Virility destroyed
Broken man
Lost boy

Sins Unforgiven
Absolution denied
Life sentence
95 percent certain

Written out of fear and gratitude for the IMRT machine which treated me for prostate cancer. LINAC is the acronym for linear accelerator made by a company called Varian Medical Systems

#cancer #prostate #fear #gratitude

5d

Sibling separation

I’m so very sorry
that you had to fight
While I was here praying
for your safety at night
Two people so similar
the same DNA
Yet one had to leave
while the other could stay
I wish I could take on
the pain you went through
As the monsters inside you
so viscously grew
And therefore my brother
I want you to know
I’m sorry it was you
and not me who had to go

#grief #loss #cancer #sorry #love #family

Oct 9

Can you help me find

My vision was of a 3D puzzle
Open your eyes it is a surprise

Reflecting a ghost on the wall
Shifting glances a death to us all

The one that was supposed to help
To be my friend turned their back

Because they could care less
A gift I would lack

How do we get sent to death
When all I know could care less

I guess to them I am second best
Can you help me find the answer

Because who is in charge
They also spread the cancer

What time are you leaving
Because of this I am grieving

Because what happened was not my fault
Just got paid the answer you are not what ought

#cancer #answer #fault #grieving #death #puzzle #3d #ghost

Oct 7

For Ron

I went to the end of the hall, your voice echoing
a cool breeze in a hot, dense mind
                         "we are going through the same thing, aren't we?"
you were up early that morning, and I had been up all night,
counting the wood panels in the cabin walls

we sat looking out over the lake in silence that morning in 2004,
not knowing that it would be our last trip.

                            I was up late that night in 2016
                              thinking of you
                                      in my mind
                                                  no hair on your head was missing

everything comes down to this
the way the night falls around
my cold hands
and fast feet
on the pavement
thump thump thump

and your heart beating
thump thump thump
until it didn't
and how they didn't really try to keep you alive
because you were old
but how they kept me in the hospital for weeks
in and out of coherence
my body heaving for air
my mind just asking
            for a break
and
        when I think of you now
clean air over the lake
           a smile on your face
as you died
I didn't know what you meant then
              but now, Ron
                                       I do.

#cancer #depression #bipolar #death #suicide

Oct 7

The Dichotomy of Love

She would tell me
about this
young black horse
&
how he used to run
through the forests
finding spots to bury
the perception of infinite love.

My adventures towards it saddened

She would then also tell me
about how he died of a
lung cancer &
that the perception of
infinite love was still alive,
unburied, undecorated
as it is, as it was.

My adventures towards it sweetened.

- Samar Charulingah Godfrey

#love #horse #sad #sweet #dichotomy #infinite #forest #bury #cancer

Oct 7

R E B O R N

...All I remember was
Cancer and my hospital room,
My green gown, my bed,
My white hair and mustache
Until suddenly...

...Reality started to stretch…

…And flatten into a brief euphoric white…

…I felt a cathartic release
As I was encapsulated and bathed
In a glorious sensation…

...I floated for an eternity…

…Until I felt my euphoria lifting…

…As my eyes reopened
I found myself gazing
Upon a room of tiny lights,
Blue and pink specs
Dotting the inner workings
Of large wall sized machines…

…They lifted me upright
In a gray metal chair
And with sharp robotic groans,
A long arm from the wall
Held up a mirror to my face...

...In the reflection was a young man
I thought I would never see again…

…I had a wife back before,
But now I have a new one
Everybody in my situation,
("Reborns", as they are called)
Has brand new things and people
Filling their lives and concerns
They bring nothing with them
When they make their returns...

…Every morning I wake up
On the west 402nd floor
Of a residential tower
Next to my slim, youthful wife
And the trails of flying cars
That populate our view
From our wall-spanning window
As they soar through the city…

…I was told of technology,
Created and discovered
That could reawaken people
Who, like me, had died
In an earlier era and time…

…It’s strange that my past,
In all its importance and meaning,
Memories, friendships and scenery,
Seems to no longer be of concern,
Now that I have all this…

…I love what was, very dearly,
But the life I live now is for me.
I have new children, knowledge,
Friends and technology…

…I’m quite sure it’s possible
That old family members
That passed before me
Could exist in the same place
That I now live and find myself…

…But I can’t be certain,
Maybe they live further,
Deeper, in an unknown future
That I can’t even comprehend…?

…All I know is that, like me,
They have a new life somewhere
So I’ll do what I tried to do
My first time around…

…I’ll continue to grow and live on
In this new, world-spanning cityscape
Fueled by the love and memory
Of a past life remembered
only by me...

#cyberpunk #reincarnation #future #cancer #memory

Oct 4

untitled- 10/01/18

it's about the time of year
that i get sad again
it's about the time of year
that i found out you were dying,
i didn't know if you'd be here at christmas

it's about the time of year
where you started slurring words
and forgetting things too,
but you bought me those boots for christmas
and told me about them a month early
you were so happy about them

it's about the time of year
where i can't breathe
i don't know if it's because of asthma
or if i'm imagining
how it felt to breathe like that

it's about the time of year
where i'd imagine i was on a boat
in the middle of a faraway lake in the UP
i'm a child again and she's much younger too
she's not sick, she's not dying

it's about the time of year
where cancer took my nonni's brain
and made her forget who she was
and how to do things

it's about the time of year
where i cried myself to sleep every night
and prayed to ***,
that he'd take anyone but her, take me instead

it's almost been 5 years and i'm still so angry

#cancer #death #sad #depressing #angry