No, Connie, it is not enough.

Yes, I do want to leave behind a legacy;

But no, that is not enough for me.

I want to live.

I want to hear the birds sing,

And see the sun shine.

I want to taste and enjoy good food.

I want to smell roses and honeysuckle,

And all the good smells of life;

And even the bad smells, which are also part of life,

And so much better than death.

I want to keep reading books, and to keep on learning.

I want to stand in what seems to be the center, and see.

I want to watch the sky go by, as the world which is I keeps on turning.

I want to remember all the girls and women that I have kissed.

And I want to keep dreaming of all the things that I have missed.

I want to hear the music that I love,

Especially,

Beethoven and my Beatles--

Who make music in my magic memory.

-----------------------

The world of life is so multiple,

In its beauty and bounty,

My heart that loves living could write the light of life an infinite list.

So then let me limit my words to what I want the most:

I want my world to stay solid and sure, and not vanish like a ghost.

I want all my memories to remain, and not die.

I want to be forever I.

Or--at the least, the very least--I don't want this cancer to kill me.

At the least, I want to have all my natural mortal years.

But I likely will not have them, not for all my heart-wept tears.

If they don't remove it, my cancer will continue to feed.

I fear my life is soon going to go;

I can feel my hopes that someone will help me,

And cut this cancer out of me,

Break and bleed.

-----------------------

Yet I still want:

I still need.

There are so many things I still want to do!

So many of my dreams never came true.

And now, so many dreamed-of deeds shall never be.

I want my soul to continue to enliven me.

But my long list of wants and needs has now caught fire:

A destructive flame,

Which threatens to destroy my flesh and mind, and even my name—

A deadly fire,

The treatments for which have already put out love’s lively fire.

I was once a passionate man; but I have lost,

And my cancer treatments have cost me even my desire.

-----------------------

But I still want.

I want to see the living eyes of my friends, like you.

And I want my eyes to stay living, too.

So, no--to answer your question--no:

It is not enough for me,

To leave a legacy

Of my poetry.

But that is all that I have left to me.

So I want to.                                                            

I want to share my deepest heart,

And my finest mind,

Before these bright lights

Depart,

And the world that is me

Goes deaf and blind;

Before the world that is me,

Ceases to be.

So then, too,

Even this reply to you—

If it be spared from sharing in my doom—

May find a little room

In someone else's heart;

And then that little part of me may live there.

And when the world that is me is gone,

That little part of me may still live on.

=======================   

Written by Michael LP, aka MLP
aka PoetWithCancer, aka PWC, aka Mr. Poet
Written on Sunday, March 24, 2009  5:45 am
Copyright © 2011 by Michael L.P.  All rights reserved