Wednesday, February 11, 2015

poem of the day 02.11.15


our first fight

okay
so this is it

this is the night
where we finally take the shit out
on each other

our first fight
our first cancer fight

you with your web sites and statistics
your lists of the damned and dead
your recovery books and odds

me with my denial
my inability to look a damned thing up

thinking that tomorrow morning
like every morning
i’ll wake up and this’ll have been
just another bad dream

we were bound to duke it out at some point
sweetheart

it might as well be tonight
a simple monday in a six day work week
that we’re both dreading

your old man in the hospital
your mother sick on chemo

MRIs and biopsies falling like rain

8p.m. and still ninety degrees outside
too hot for us to eat anything
but cold cuts and barbecue chips

too depressing to do a thing but have this fight

so let’s start this, shall we?
let’s get this over and maybe get past this

have a beer or some more wine
a shit ton of scotch if it’s okay

you tell me once again
how insensitive and mean i’m being

and i’ll tell you how fucking crazy you are
for reading those books
instead of talking to your doctor

i’ll say shit like
if i were you….
if it were me….

even though i don’t know
up from down these days

we can throw things
and shout at the top of our lungs

rattle the walls of this old apartment
that was once so inviting
but seems so sinister now

with its orange walls and cracked blinds
its years of love and loss

its two most famous occupants
facing each other ready for a duel

neither of us with the guts to tell each other
how goddamned scared

we really are

                                                            07.09.14/09.17.14

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