You Never Finish Cancer
LISTEN NOW
You never finish cancer rather it finishes you
In the old school meaning of finishing school
As it was for young women they were finished off
Refashioned, then fashioned all over again
Simmered until soft and malleable
Every trace of natural, inborn confidence stripped away
until they could never again trust themselves
Their minds their bodies to give the right message
Completing finishing school was the achievement
Now they could adeptly collapse themselves
deftly pack themselves away put their souls into moth balls
Their frizzy hair their crazy faces their enthusiastic gait
In the chance that they might resurrect themselves
In some undiscovered future
It's like this cancer
If you are clever you learn to smile on cue
As the radiographer says 'small prick'
And slides the cannula into your vein.
You hand it all over to them with a smile
You observe objectively as the bag of chemo
perched studiously above you drips relentlessly into you
You sign your name on the bottom of one paper and another
describing the risks of each procedure
You are finished and you know it.
