Thursday's Hammer

(For my Patient Counselor: How could you do this to me?)

Here I am, all alone.
On this day, Thursday--the day of the week
That once meant I had friends to go see.
Now Thursdays mean the opposite to me.
False friends who turned on me,
And kicked me out to feel my misery,
On my own.
So now, sorrowful and lonely,
Thursdays, once the best days, are now the worst.
Freighted with increased grief, and ruined with regret; and showered with shame.
For this ouster slanders my good name;
For how many will believe me, that I am unguilty of any such wrong,
As could justify this brutal expulsion?  All for a saddened song.
-----------------------
I'm poisoned and crippled by these dreadful cancer treatments.
I've been castrated and condenmed to die without pleasure or love.
Dying with sorrow, grief, pain, and despair.
My patient counselor has greatened my grief, and made my anxiety more intense.
The counselor pushed me away and out, with a cold-blooded implacable shove.
Am I a human being?  Am I worth anything?  Was this right, or wrong?  Fair, or unfair?
My depression, deep before, now deepens, dropping my world into the spider's lair.
-----------------------
My so-called support has been snatched away, letting me fall.
My suport group, that seemed to love me, didn't love me at all.
Now they are all gathered, at this very moment.
Now they are smiling and speaking, taking turns.
I was told this was a place for me,
To fellowship, share good and bad news, and even vent.
Now my heart aches and my stomach churns.
My chest feels the pressure of an elephant's foot.
But now, they are talking and smiling.
That is what was for me beguiling;
Making me think their smiles included me.
While they speak and support each other, they share in snacks and drinks.
While they talk love, they laugh at the passing time.
Well, all the centuries of time have been strung together from little blinks.
I'll be dead soon enough, and too soon.
Soon, they'll stand and join hands, for an uplifting message from one.
Why am I not there?
Am I so out of tune?
Am I so terrible that I have to be this lonely, till my life is done?
Where is my friend that I thought was my friend?
The patient counselor who once invited me to come in?
I'd still like to think my oncologist is really my friend.  Now, I'm not sure what to think.
My soul sears in pain, my mind splinters into shards, deeper into despair I sink.
It feels like this is going to go on forever; but, really, it will soon end.
-----------------------
My depression and anxiety weigh today on my chest like a lead ton.
And, oh God, there is so much fear!  Such terrible fear!
I don't want to die!  I don't want to disappear!
I need an understanding someone to be near.
But I have to hold all my suffering inside my heart, all alone, here.
While they, my former seeming friends, laugh and lock hands in my forbidden there.
How can God care about me, when even my fellow and sister sufferers do not care?
Or do they care?  Do some of them care?  How many?  All?  A few?  None?  Anyone? 
I don't know.
I was not allowed to talk with them before I had to go.
Maybe it's only the counselor who does not like me.
Maybe the patient counselor just didn't like my latest poetry.
No reason really was given to me, no cause why this is so.
I think no real reason could be given to explain giving me such pain, nor any cause justify
Making my life more miserable in my shortened time, the little time left to me, before I die.
I just don't know. 
To do this to me--and, even worse, the way that it was done--seems so cruel.
But I know that there is something even crueler crouching in me, that is planning to pounce.
At some point in time, the cancer will start eating my bones.
My calling music will be muffled, by pain, into my last futile cries and moans.
My bones will be so bitten and chewed, I won't even make a good skeleton.


--PoetWithCancer
aka Mr. Poet, aka M.L.P.
Thursday, August 20, 2009  6:30 PM PDT
104 degrees F.  Winds 0 MPH
Copyright © 2010 by M.L.P.  All rights reserved