Where to begin? Back
in June of 2014 my wife, Ally Malinenko, was diagnosed with stage-one lobular
cancer. I won’t go into a lot of the details….for that you can check out her wonderful
blog. For familial reasons I was unable to post any knid of poem on the topic,
which was pretty hard considering cancer consumed the bulk of my 2014. I guess
I did the best I could on this blog. There were, however, some real low points.
That said, we got sort of lucky, if there is a lucky where cancer is involved.
Ally’s tumor was caught early. She didn’t need chemotherapy. Honestly, as I
said above, for those interested in the details it’s best to check her blog.
On my end I’m going to be spending the next few weeks or so
posting poems that were written during that time, about our situation, etc. So
the poems about bad jobs, bad girlfriends, idiots on public transportation,
beer shits and the like will cease for a small amount of time. For those of you
hit with a disease as miserable as cancer I do empathize with you.
you stupid girls
you stupid girls
you stupid fucking girls
quit walking so slow to the train
quit stopping to grab each other and shout
OH MY GOD!
like you’re in a constant state of wonder and surprise
quit stopping to check your cell phones
this wretched world doesn’t revolve around you
but it’ll chew you up and spit you out without notice
and nothing is ever happening anyway
i’ve been listening to your conversation
it is enough to torture out lies from an honest man
you stupid girls
you miserable fucking girls
get out of my way or let me pass
or i swear i’ll toss you both down a flight of stairs
and leave you twitching on the concrete
you see, i have a wife newly of ten years
she’s waiting on me at home
and tonight we’re going to celebrate our anniversary
with italian food and red wine
we’re going to pretend
that we didn’t spend this morning in an oncology office
as some surgeon felt up her breasts
and checked her armpits for lymph node lumps
you stupid girls
you wouldn’t know anything about that now, huh?
cancer
what an arbitrary word to a couple of little hussies like
you
stupid fucking girls
with your oversized headphones on your pinheads
with your shorts that don’t cover your boney, sexless asses
you’re just standing there impeding my progress
you don’t understand love
you can’t possibly
i hope that neither of you will experience
the kind of happiness that i have had for the last ten years
the kind that i want for another thirty or forty more
you stupid girls
you don’t deserve it
i can see the bleach stains on your yellowing teeth
you can’t hide your rot from the world
no one can
the best that any of us can do is get up
and go to bed and do it all over again
try to find a little bit of happiness in the middle
you stupid girls
like tonight
like anniversaries and italian food and red wine
toasting the past and anticipating the future
my wife
you stupid girls
you stupid fucking girls
give me an inch
just one simple inch
or be decent and carve me a pathway
stop looking at me and laughing
and then slowing down on purpose to dance
give me my freedom
give me release
give me my life tonight
you girls
you stupid girls
you stupid fucking girls
MOVE!
06.13.14
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