"interferon" poems
i am the controlled group
i expected interferon and
i got a saline injection
hepatitis c is the
monster
hiding under my skin
i've called for 300,000 favors
from faceless friends - IRC, IRBs, dietitians, physicians
to try to cheat the system
and to cheat the 4 horsemen
harbinging my own internal apocalypse
"If they don't give me anything,"
I began calmly to my wife;
"the scars on my guts will generate another
Chernobyl out of frustration;
out wanting to see my son graduate."
my white blood cell count is 3
and i will wreck this study
go to mexico
and buy as much real medicine
as i need to survive
rudely refusing the FDA's
50% miracle drug
the ingenious intravenous
sugar pill
i only have 3
white blood cells
circumventing valuable scientific knowledge
is not off the table
i will walk away in slow motion
after saving my liver from
hepatitis hellfire horse jockeys in lab coats
with the entirety of clinical research
burning behind me
Jan 1, 2014
Jan 1, 2014 at 8:02 AM UTC
summer incisions on a crystalline day
(it sorrows me to end a poem this way)
every leaf, every tree,
edged silhouetted sharp
against the pale blue cadet uniform color of a
portrait background framing sky,
this museum piece painting,
unsigned, unguarded, uninsured,
yet, surely the worlds most valuable
the sun's early morn golden glint reflection,
somehow pools in the palm of the each chlorophyll green flat goblet,
this necklace of carat gold cavatine melodies
gets me happy drunk on an aurora of
the green n' blue seasonal summer's glories,
upon the skin-stamped a caramel hallmark,
what we wait for all year long,
all the earth's colors crystalline pure,
my senses say it's as it was
on the first day of creation
this is not the first day of summer 2014,
yet, it should be so remarked,
for summer visions so perfect crystalline
are summer incisions,
allowing entry of interferon hopes of we irregular,
imperfected assorted human shapes,
the marvel of a free-for-all serenity,
nature's sweet permanent kindness to
wayfaring temporal humans
corporeal that I am, my being flooded
by all of this and a grateful satisfaction,
but my mind knows that as real as all this,
is as well, the not well, the ashen pallor inside,
the burnt tongue words that circulate
in my bloodstream, the status of my
reality, where my job, survival, is a
Monday day to one day thing, and where the luxury of being
summer incised
is a sometime thing
*and it sorrows me to end this poem this way
but I come from another place this day*
and the computer asks
save this poem?
and I answer,
no, save me, save my family,
even if it must rain every day for the rest of my
sunsetting life
*and it sorrows me to end this poem this way
but I come from another place this day*
Jun 8, 2014
Jun 8, 2014 at 7:38 AM UTC
distorted face, discolored and slim.
haunt me through eternity.
Feb 12, 2012
Feb 12, 2012 at 7:21 PM UTC