Today, in honor of Blog for your Breasts day, in honor of the several Write Sisters who are breast cancer survivors, in honor of the cousin I spent an hour with on the phone last night because she's in that horrible place between the questionable mammogram and the needle biopsy. . . .
I'd like to direct you to this wonderful collection.
Those are not the only poems on the oncolink site, by the way. Here's a sample:
The Mastectomy Poems
12. Epilogue: Nevertheless
Alicia Suskin Ostriker
From The Crack in Everything Copyright © 1996 University of Pittsburgh Press
The bookbag on my back, I'm out the door.
Winter turns to spring
The way it does, and I buy dresses.
A year later, it gets to where
When they say How are you feeling,
With that anxious look on their faces,
And I start to tell them the latest
About my love life or my kids' love lives,
Or my vacation or my writer's block-
It actually takes me a while
To realize what they have in mind-
I'm fine, I say, I'm great, I'm clean.
The bookbag on my back, I have to run.
Poetry Friday is hosted this week by Jennie
7 comments:
Great poem! I know what Ostriker means when she says, It actually takes me a while
To realize what they have in mind-
It often takes a lot longer for those around us to get over cancer. I was through with it in July '02, and I never looked back!
What a good choice for today, Sally. I had a teeny tiny little scare this past May, and it was only then that I realized it was my ten year anniversary. That's how rarely I think about it.
Anyone who's newly or recently diagnosed can take some comfort in that. It DOES get better!
The poem is great!
J
I love how the book bag stands in for all the "regular life" stuff the speaker is ready to shoulder again. Great poem.
Great choice, Sally! Thanks for sharing both the poem and the link.
I loved when that happened -- when people asked me, "How ARE you?" and all I could think to tell them was the news of the day, not some cancer-related report! It's been 13 years! HOORAY!!
Good for you Mary Lee! Statistically, the odds of a woman getting breast cancer are one in eight. In our Write Sisters group of seven, three of us are breast cancer survivors. We're obviously a bunch of over-achievers!
Thank you for sharing this--great poem, and one that makes me want to celebrate. And joy and congratulations to all you survivors!
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