"chemotherapy" poems
•helping the kids with homework•
no one told you,
was part of the job description
paycheck earner a-ok,
gruff but tender lover,
knowing her special places,
building a tree swing,
a tree house safe and satisfactory,
one the neighbors envy
taking them to the hospital for
broken arms and chemotherapy,
part two of the non-routine but a very possible foreseeable,
going to school to give that principal a look
that will make him think twice before suspending
one of his for defending himself
you remember your daddy doing the same for you,
forgetting to repeat the tar and hiding that came later
the tucking in, the pretense ouch
when your end of day
scratchy beard ruffling the skin of babies,
carrying tissues in a toolbox,
never heard of, nevertheless done,
tho not a memory defining the future inclusive,
definitely a learning ability, a likeability
doing homework, nuh uh,
no way jose, don’t dare let them
know how you never got a gold star,
always sat in the back row, outta sight,
all day dreaming, chemistry rhymes with mystery,
and poetry is rhymes needing a big vocabulary
which means lots of words for a man who don’t talk much
ain’t exactly his strong suit
sure, heard of Shakespeare but never met him,
know where the on/off computer button hides,
the rest is up to them;
got no email address, but taught them sir and ma’am,
how to address humans with respect,
i’ll promise them anything
but not doing any homework,
unless it the kind that that makes
“a home work”
Jul 22, 2018
Jul 22, 2018 at 9:20 AM UTC
They say that smell
Is your strongest sense
When tied to memory.
That just a whiff of a smell
Or even thought of a
Smell can bring you back
To a place and a time that
You had previously
Thought were left behind.
For me the smell of
Bleach is comfort, as my
Nanny used it as a
Standard, household
Cleaner. I love that smell
As well as of my favorite
Dinner, mildew (reminds me of summers spent
At camp, living out of a trunk) and
My favorite flowers
Each of these smells I
Love to revisit time and
Time again. One smell
Though has embedded
Itself in my memory and if
I have my way, I’ll never
Smell it again.
Mom had Colon cancer most
Of my time in
High school.
No clue on the stage
But it was best not
To
Ask
Surgeries, chemo, radiation, the
Whole
Nine
Things seemed to be fine,
Well, even great
Until it took a turn
My mom has never been
Skinny; she is petite, but
Normal
Suddenly she looked like
A holocaust victim
She would get quiet
Draw into herself
For periods of time
Another surgery. Fine
She returned home
And then something crept in
That something was death
And I’ll never know how I knew
You just know.
The smell of something
Dying
Isn’t pleasant
It puts you on edge
And turns your stomach
Mom was confident
That she was getting better
The smell, that can’t
Be described (dying tissue, pain
Suffering) was glaring
To me
I never asked Mom or Dad
If they could smell it
Because the smell of Death
Isn’t a sense that should
Be shared
I would just maintain that
I didn’t think
Something was right
A day or so later
Surgery. Fine. Home.
Smell.
Surgery. Fine. Home.
Smell.
Surgery. Fine. Home.
After that last
Surgery. The smell
Left. But even now
When I think back
To that time
That complicated time of
Soccer games
Chemotherapy
Apply to college
Surgeries
The one thing in the
Foreground
Is
That
Smell
Just a whiff of death
Of human decay
Of dying
Of suffering
And I’ve had my fill
For a lifetime
Sep 27, 2013
Sep 27, 2013 at 1:58 AM UTC
College is a cancer clinic.
At this university, you either live long enough to die,
or die until you want to live.
Kids drag backpacks like bags of morphine,
and are attached to their planners like they are their heart monitors.
You do your own chemotherapy,
as you poison yourself with debt,
and Friday night nickel shots.
Jun 24, 2014
Jun 24, 2014 at 1:11 PM UTC
I have been told that a love left untouched will never disappear; that because the corrosive oils from our fingertips have not dissolved its coloring, it will, theoretically, endure perpetually. This love, left in its shrink-wrap casing, looming over the heads of the meek and the caustic feels like a scarlet letter hidden behind the robe, a feeling so foul none are to know but, Oh, what if it begins to fester, there in the moist dark?
This worry had been sitting in my stomach, churning with the bile and swallowed blood, coming up acid in my throat; I could feel it radiating out. Thought: it must be nuclear, must be radioactive and glowing, eating through me one layer at a time, but love –this uranium longing– has a half-life.
When first the reaction began it boiled and popped like lye on skin, singed off my eyelids so I could not help but see it there. I found myself woozy from the fumes, a high I had never experienced before so I inhaled, let it torch my lungs and leave me gagging. My hair began to fall out. I was soggy from the chemotherapy, tried pumping this bitterness into my bloodstream to remove the evil that already existed there, unaware that they were the same entity. It could not survive on a diet of itself and obsession, and so it began waning.
An exponential decay, the intensity of this passion varying directly with the frequency of contact and inversely with time, yet it will never be gone, entirely. It will decrease incrementally every time I say good bye, every time I see scarred knuckles, every time I want and he does not. I have counted the days since the day I counted on him and he was accountable and the number is growing larger and getting more difficult to remember. I have scribbled it onto scraps of paper and it has only browned the edges, no longer burns all the way through, and this love –this radium affair– has been losing its toxicity.
Apr 13, 2015
Apr 13, 2015 at 7:54 PM UTC
Her eyes are so deep set now
that in a certain light
they are just holes in her face
She is so thin now
from the chemotherapy
her skin seems little more than
an empty balloon stretched over her skeleton
and tied off at the scalp,
to keep what’s left of her from falling out
She shakes so bad now
that she needs assistance
to cease the drought
on the jagged landscape of her lips
Now, her days are spent
in an endless sleep
punctuated by a waking sleep
in which she does a lot of staring at walls
and vomiting
That waking sleep, or living nightmare,
is itself punctuated by the occasional friend
come to mourn at the gravemarker
that is her hospital bed
She now has sympathy for the zombie
knowing what it’s like to be dead
and alive at the same time
She thinks, if she had the energy,
she might bite people too
just to remind them
that she’s still here
Apr 14, 2014
Apr 14, 2014 at 12:25 PM UTC
The white cells,
seemingly not fearful of
oozing,
festering,
metastasizing,
fear black cells,
wearing hijabs or dreads.
The white cells
are fearful of the brown cells
that **** and process their chickens
and mow their lawns for them.
The white cells fear the red cells
though they like moccasins, canoes,
and wild rice soup,
fear yellow cells
may be smarter than them
so they label them
***** and Chinks.
The white cells
don’t seem to mind
asphalt-coating,
starlight-stealing,
convenience store sprawl
devouring healthy green cells--
alfalfa cells,
forest cells,
swampy, boggy cells,
black-eyed susan cells.
The Chamber of Commerce
calls it growth,
progress;
but this town
needs a tourniquet,
maybe chemotherapy.
Feb 13, 2019
Feb 13, 2019 at 3:17 PM UTC
Cheer me up with a knitted cancer hat
and a joke about tomorrow's goal
being that of getting to the end,
safe and unharmed past the chemotherapy combat.
Clear me up with plastic pills that
sit on the tongue and slit the throat
and the surrounding gum,
all to get better and to get back on the feet.
Cheat me with wise words that you
pawned off of pages and curdled
website phrases that offer
nothing more than a little comfort for yourself.
Take me to where tracks lead to tracks that lead to douglas fir lined, dirtier farmyard tracks and let me breathe in that sap, that golden wood-coated scent that'll wrap itself around my nostrils and hat.
Aug 8, 2013
Aug 8, 2013 at 1:03 PM UTC
i.
the poem has a beginning exactly as you’d expect it:
pa in sweatshirt, ma with purse; the funny thing is
i never used to call them those names:
“pa,”
“ma,”
always found them too cowboy-ish,
too un-me, un-like
us: who held chopsticks before dinner time and shared
stories of how grandpa came over from china.
ii. (at the dinner table)
there is no symbolism here. there has been none
for a while now. this household eats and
eats in quiet. my grandmother is a poet but their
books all burned down
back in ’45 when mao stormed into fujian and
all her uncles could eloquent on was that
“the communists were coming!”
“the communists were coming!”
and instead of poems took with them their
children, and their gold to pawn
and their clothes on their muddy
mortar-stained backs
and the japanese
iii.
my grandfather now comes twice a week to the
hospital for chemotherapy. it is a nice hospital.
good view of the cleanest part of our *****
city. there are lights and white folks now. two things
my dad said did not used to be there. they
used to be spanish. they tilled
our rice fields and spent the money on living rooms
with lots and lots of space to sleep. we on the other hand,
worked. he claims.
your grandfather and his grandfather and i
iv.
awake every sunday morning at precisely 8:30.
made to go down to the temple in kalesas
and told to fetch the office paper for
noontime reading. see we weren’t spoiled: grew
up just next to the pasig river which back in
the 70s did not smell as bad as sin only
sweatshirts
and the sweat we soaked them in we reeled along
steamed fish heads and chopsticks for picking at them with
and bowls of rice we never really ate with spoons.
v. (back at the dinner table)
i listen to my mom and dad
sweat profusely in the evening heat only we can have here
he in his sweatshirt and she
with her golden purse,
preparing to leave - a wedding party awaits -
an jacket draped over his shirt just like grandfather used to do it
in a sense,
but gripping the chopsticks delicately for all us
to see:
“pa,”
“ma,”
v.
it is not cowboys that give us our names.
Feb 11, 2016
Feb 11, 2016 at 11:55 AM UTC
When I was young,
I had long curly hair
That cascaded down my back
Like an ominous waterfall;
So dark and thick, it seemed to go on forever.
But, when I was in school, it was always tied up.
It was a challenge for my mother to tame it with a brush
And keep it in the confines of a bun.
She said it was to keep my hair
from getting to my and others’ faces.
But some people still managed to make me feel bad for having such “unruly” hair
when the most it’s been exposed is when I take out my hair tie just to tie it back up again.
For years I tried to straighten it;
Hair rebonding every year,
Straightening iron ever morning,
Damaged hair and damaged pride every day.
They say a woman’s hair is her crown;
She must wear it with her chin up
And flaunt it unabashedly.
This is to the girls who do.
This is to the girls who dye their hair magnificent colors
To match their colorful personalities.
This is to the girls who cut their own hair
Because hair salons charge so much for a trim.
This is to the girls who shave all their hair for charity
Or for support of the girls in chemotherapy.
But this is also for the girls in chemotherapy,
Who are still thriving even though they’re suffering.
This is also to the girls whose hair are being treated like an anomaly,
Their braids being pulled and afros being patted.
This is also to the girls who can’t land a job
Because their skills were degraded by their “unprofessional” hair.
A woman’s hair is her crown
But a queen does not need a crown.
A queen is not just some girl with a shiny thing on her head.
A queen is a figure of power, compassion and grace.
She wears the crown, not the other way around.
Jul 23, 2017
Jul 23, 2017 at 5:51 AM UTC
the same old line jumps off my tongue
hi, how are you
i'm fine, how are you?
i'm well, thank you
this time,
there is a pause
the old man looks at me
his skinned is tanned as a hide
but not as wrinkled as some
you can see through his blue eyes
his spirit lurks close to the surface of his eyes
they seem to contain a whirlwind of white clouds and sky
his gray hair is quite dark and shiny
it lays in columns on his head
combed to perfection
we're both lying the old man says quietly
i look up
surprised that someone would question my honesty
i really am well i tell him how are you lying?
i just got out of chemotherapy
he tells me this matter of factly and i feel slightly awkward as i look up at him from my work
i'm sorry. your hair looks great.
thank you.
your total is 53.54. i hope you have a good day.
thank you. the same to you.
the conversation was over
and i will never see the old man with cancer who came through my check out line ever again
Aug 1, 2012
Aug 1, 2012 at 9:41 PM UTC
If I get Cancer
and undergo Chemotherapy
and begin to lose my hair,
I'm certainly getting
a badass scalp tattoo.
Feb 17, 2014
Feb 17, 2014 at 4:14 AM UTC
Cigarettes, I know you will be the death of me,
but you relieve me of my stress.
Cigarettes, I bought you for a total of 12.99,
you are my everyday investment.
Cigarettes, I smoke you 10 times a day,
aiming for a total of 15.
Cigarettes, you make my heart ache, but my loyalty for you is timeless.
Cigarettes, I think I have lung cancer, I will see you soon after chemotherapy,
Cigarettes, my blood pressure increased.
Cigarettes, sorry I was gone, I suffered a stroke.
Cigarettes, why am I being hospitalized?
Cigarettes, are you trying to harm me?
Cigarettes, will nicotine help treat my addictions I have for you?
Cigarettes, I feel sick.
Cigarettes, "hello are you there?"
ANSWER ME!!
Cigarettes ----------------------------------------------
Aug 25, 2018
Aug 25, 2018 at 2:48 AM UTC
When I saw you in your casket, it brought tears to my eyes.
You died two years ago today on the thirteenth day of July.
When the doctors said that your illness was terminal, I didn't want to believe that it was true.
But sadly, they were correct and two years ago today, we lost you.
From 1975 to 2010 you worked at Woodcraft, you worked with lumber.
People may think that I'm crazy because I believe that 13 is an unlucky number.
You died on the thirteenth year of the century and also on the thirteenth day of July.
You took Chemotherapy treatments for months and two years ago today, you died.
Jul 13, 2015
Jul 13, 2015 at 3:06 PM UTC
A Tribute
A king takes supper on a creaking deathbed. Featureless, winged creatures zoom by the dark condensed windows. Micro parasites build adobe headquarters in his soft tissue. Reaching for a plate, he groans the terabyting howl that’s prescribed with chemotherapy. Qwerty and light from the drugs, he stares at the apple on his tray. Lost in its curves, he finds himself trapped in a safari of memories. A dream devolves upon his downtrodden mind….
The canopy is populated with twittering, angry birds. Pools of social blood attract flies to the googolplex degree. He stumbles through the dell, suspicious forest while a tremulous, fiery fox stalks behind his echoing footfalls. Pixar apes swing from trees chased by grisly, disney men with guns and trucks. A large eye tunes the darkness and blinks red upon an aging mountain lion in shadow’s brush.
The sony rays belight foliage in auspicious, plaid-orange hues. This amazon of experience plugs the wanderer into a hard drive of intelligence – a gateway to an encyclopedia of wikis and browsers, expanse enough for any backdrop rooftop audience to be faux-enthralled and eager. There are grumblings in the distance of another engine tromping the scope in search of something new and useless. A rumorous bat upsets the plagiarizing tide of the Atlantic Pea Sea. A snake slinks out of the blossoms clinging to the vines among a macintosh tree and bites the salty flier of the washboard night; cyber venom invades his veins.
The average, homeless, bounding, warrior awakens to find a cold supper on his lap and another syringe in his arm. His remaining gums support his teeth as they bite into the apple. He swallows, sighs, and rests his balding, crescent, once-handsome head on the white pillow. The green fruit tumbles gently out of bed and mutely rolls to the floor.
With that, Steve Jobs is dead.
Oct 22, 2012
Oct 22, 2012 at 12:03 AM UTC
Amber drips from the 60’s-style lamps
on two end tables.
Brassy-orange and bulbous,
they illuminate the tangled tracks.
The light spills onto the floor
like heavy freight abandoning its car.
It spawns the locomotive shadow
cast by my grandmother’s sunken-in couch.
I nestle myself snug between the pillows,
dense and flattened by years of Sundays.
Sundays that bring my father
close to his brother, not a brother at all.
I peer over the edge
and heave a hushed “all aboard.”
Grandma sleeps to unwind
the day’s knot of exhaustion.
Each bone-bleach white fiber frays
from the chemotherapy that robs
her gnarled hands of their strength.
This one-way ticket marks the end of a journey
of a once well-oiled machine.
The exhales of a CSX
spout its peppery breath out in opaque puffs.
I am a conductor, tearing the ticket
of tonight’s traveler.
Rising to my bare feet now,
I sink into the cushion like wet sand.
The train thrusts and in a single bound,
I leap from the ledge and leave my lone passenger.
The cars whir and hum alongside me.
Deafening metallic wind rusts the edge of the rug.
I’m still waiting for her return,
and in denial that it was her last train.
Sep 23, 2013
Sep 23, 2013 at 3:38 PM UTC
You were diagnosed with Leukemia and sadly, you didn't survive.
If you hadn't died 111 months ago, today you would've turned 75.
You were born on October the 18th of 1947.
But 111 months ago, you went to Heaven.
Your hair grew back after chemotherapy made it fall out.
When you were told you would die, there was no doubt.
It must have been terrifying when you learned that you were terminally ill.
You had to battle cancer and it was not easy to go through such an ordeal.
Today would've been your 75th birthday.
But 111 months ago, you were taken away.
Oct 18, 2022
Oct 18, 2022 at 9:51 AM UTC
Our love is like a cancer.
I’m fighting for my life again.
Stage One.
The first time you appeared,
you filled my brain with affection,
that felt as if it were like oxygen,
a necessity for my survival.
You came on to me,
fast and overpowering,
feelings I hadn’t felt before,
you and only you is what I grasp onto.
I can’t eat but slowly you consume me.
Our love is like a cancer.
I’m fighting for my life again.
Stage Two.
I like turns into I love,
my affection for you is growing like a sponge,
soaking up every bit you can give to me.
Little did I know you were a poisonous being,
embedding yourself into my brain you ***** wretch,
clouding my emotions by threading my prefrontal cortex with detrimental lies.
Our love is like a cancer.
I’m fighting for my life again.
Stage Three.
The symptoms are there,
yelling loud and clear like an angry father,
when curfew wasn’t met.
My reality becomes evident when I see your hand in hers,
I become trapped in an ache that I can internally feel,
and that others can physically see in my figure.
I decide to cut you out like a surgeon
and try to mend the pieces that are severed.
Our love is like a cancer.
I’m fighting for my life again.
Stage Four.
I try to heal but it seems to be no use,
the ache persists not only in my head,
but has spread to my heart.
My body is conquered by chemical reactions like chemotherapy,
trying to wipe out the memories we have created and disease you are to me.
But still my body, my soul is weak and fragile
like a dry leaf in autumn,
crumbling,
only after time will it be able to remise.
Our love is like a cancer.
I’m fighting for my life again.
Remission.
You are vacant from me,
but you will always linger.
Feb 29, 2012
Feb 29, 2012 at 9:02 PM UTC
My Evidence professor told us
Testimony is not believable
Unless other facts back it up.
That terrified me.
My word means nothing
Unless I’ve left a trail of breadcrumbs
But I was raised to clean up
After I eat.
The chemotherapy left Dad a full head of hair,
And no one questioned his diagnosis.
Yet you search for scars on my wrists
As if corroborating evidence is necessary
To prove I’m not ok.
Our nation was founded on the ideas of liberty and justice
And I have the right to be thought of as
Innocent until proven guilty
Clearly you paid attention in civics
Because you hold on to this principle
With every ounce of willpower you possess.
The only thing is,
I didn’t realize mental illness is a crime.
Feb 5, 2015
Feb 5, 2015 at 12:10 PM UTC
The smell of burnt moments is
Haunting me.
The taste of ashes,
like a bittersweet friend,
Savoured in my tastebuds, mixed with
Chemotherapy
I used to be a young soul
Only fourteen winters had tested me.
But suddenly I had to discard the label of
"Cheerful and promising youth"
And replaced it with
"dying"
It's funny how life works out some times, and in this case -
How it didn't.
Apr 29, 2017
Apr 29, 2017 at 10:24 PM UTC
Creased lines in your cancer bed sheets
and red wine spills still remain
from that time you celebrated
your chemotherapy success.
Drug-blue cocktails were swapped
for beers from cans,
needles for straws and hospital-stock-
comfortable-armchairs for the advertised sofa in your part furnished floor.
Friends came with warm welcomes prepared
in the back of taxis coming from the city,
they came in wide eyed staring,
holding wine bottles remembering your once real wig of hair.
Jan 29, 2014
Jan 29, 2014 at 9:50 AM UTC
Pathological.
Unrealistically:
Chemotherapy?
Oct 29, 2012
Oct 29, 2012 at 12:19 AM UTC
My hair fall shampoo
Didn't quite work
This time around.
May 30, 2014
May 30, 2014 at 7:37 AM UTC
i'm sure you could imagine,
the new proud parents' joy.
when the doctor finally announced,
"you have a baby boy"
as she held him in her arms,
all their worries were erased.
they didn't know then,
of the troubles they would face.
"i'm sorry i have to be the one to say,
your little boy has cancer.
i know that life seems hard today,
things are always worse before the get better."
endless hours of chemotherapy,
hospitals becoming a second home.
dozens of tests to check his status,
he was watched but felt so alone.
some days he felt big and strong,
and other days trapped in hell.
it was in the little boy's smile,
the way that you could tell.
and though the boy was small in size,
he fought with all his might.
the cancer's strength he matched for awhile,
he put up a pretty good fight.
time of death, 4:12
his mother smoothed down his hair,
and kissed him on his cheek.
the tears rolled down her face,
she'd never felt so weak.
his father felt his son's heart beat,
then fall silent just as fast.
he had been there for his son's first,
and he had felt his son's last.
Apr 9, 2014
Apr 9, 2014 at 8:28 PM UTC