Modern Medical Miracles
– Poetry by Jane H. Fitzgerald –
Last Treatment Prophecy
Our emotions are raw
Kept tightly wrapped
We talk of friends, the weather
Never, what if…………
Waiting this time
is like watching for a birth
full of anxiety and expectation
Our patience so thin
We are afraid of drowning
standing on thin ice
Eons later we are summoned
Our name jolts us
Echoing off the walls
We tensely grab
the life line
Guardedly entering the office
The doctor greets us warmly
I’m choking on a primal scream
What’s churning unseen
A spread of evil or release
The suspense is deafening
With a caring tone
The doctor carefully explains
cancer is currently banished
Its persistent force
may visit again
But for now it’s erased
Tears of relief flood my soul
I’m flying wild like a caged bird
escaping skyward
Carrying the weary weight
up and away
Leaving us lighter, freer
The black path faintly visible
Cancer no longer our identity
It’s like a rebirth
We are beyond grateful
for our intelligent, kind doctor
Gifted recipients
of a modern medical miracle
Awake again
Out of the shadows
Washed with sunlight
Filled with precious life
Immunotherapy
I’m sitting with virulent chemicals
Dripping steadily into my arm
Coursing through my veins
Like pollutants flowing to the sea
An experimental treatment
Promising, results unknown
Still, I’ll grab the chance
It beats eminent death
I’ll gamble with Russian Roulette
A Hail Mary Pass
Other patients receive infusions
Suffering through chemotherapy
They will slowly lose their hair
Like leaves drifting in the fall
Destination winter, or if lucky, spring
They will feel nauseous, lose weight
Become walking symbols of disease
Immunotherapy is more insidious
No predictable outward signs so far
A month, a year or more after treatment
A serious, or fatal reaction could strike
It’s like a gun pointed at my head
Maybe the next chamber will be empty
And the next? How many chances?
My body is part of a study
Will my torture benefit the future?
My life prolonged as a bullseye
Anticipating the perfect shot
Thankful and Terrified
For my Savior and Killer
Endless Waiting
Each minute is an agonizing
crucible
Anticipating cancer test destiny
Longing for unveiled truth
Emotions raw like a prisoner’s
on death row
Waiting, waiting
Endless nightmare of uncertainty
Technicians and radiologists
Please have mercy
Unchain our heavy hearts
Work with jet like speed
Deliver our fate
Life and death words printed
on winged paper
Flying us to heaven or hell
Whatever it may be
Nothing is more torturous
Than cruel dark ignorance
Will there be another sunrise
or is it
The final death of days
About the Author – Jane H. Fitzgerald
Jane H. Fitzgerald has been writing poetry for over thirty years. She is an enthusiastic and sensitive poet who writes about emotional challenges, nature and time. Jane holds an MA degree from Columbia University where she studied poetry with David Ignatow. She has written four books of poetry which can be found on Amazon under Jane H. Fitzgerald.
Did you like these poems by Jane H. Fitzgerald? Then you might also like:
The Identified Patient
What I want the surgeon to know
Sanctuary, and other poems
The Body as Poem
Metaplasia and other poems
This is What Death Does
Where Courage Lives
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