Words have not been forthcoming.
Telling the truth is hard.
Makes me think of my blog award from last year. What an honour to get an award just for telling the truth. Lots of truth. It sounds simple but that doesn’t make it easy.
Author: writersamr
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room
there is room for poetry now
while I am wondering
whether I will die
or if I just won’t be able
to create new life.
While I’m wondering
why people choose such
vague words
while keeping my own
words only as
specific as I can
handle.
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Why Big Birthdays Are Important To This Cancer Survivor
Last night I wrote the following tweet, which got more attention than I thought it would:
Birthday in a few weeks! Don’t think people realize how important my 30th is to me as a cancer survivor. It is a landmark I will feel privileged to reach. If anyone did already realise that, I would declare them my bff right now; that would be impressive. Blog to follow tomorrow.
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Late night introspection
Been at home for most of the day and I decide it’s time to write a blog post at 11:20pm. Better make it quick!
Tonight has turned very introspective. I have been reading online and thinking about how maybe I have some kind of social anxiety and that holds me back by making me think I can’t do the things I might want to, making me unable to say stuff in meetings, not want to go to social events sometimes, not want to do things that make me the centre of attention. There is a CBT app but it’s like $99 for a month which seems pretty expensive. I’m in therapy at the moment, three sessions in but I’m not sure if it’s really doing anything for me and I have three sessions left and don’t really know what I’m going to talk about in them. Anyway, I’ve just been thinking about the things I wish I could change, really. And social anxiety might be something I can change. But the things I’ve been talking to my therapist about seem to be things that we can’t change, like having bad dreams, flashbacks, bad memories, anxiety about checkups. Cancer-related things, seem to be things I can’t change, or that’s what it’s sounding like.
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I asked our mum
On Tuesday I had my first counselling appointment. My pouch has been playing up for like five days. Last night I had another bad dream. Next Friday is my uncle’s funeral. It hasn’t been the best of weeks. This prose thing that follows happened last weekend.
I wanted to make something out of this, a poem or something. But it is what it is. It doesn’t need dressing up.
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Midlands
“The world should be GOLD today!”
the sun declares, and gathers up its
friends – the tiny mirror images of itself
from far-flung beaches. It summons the
wind to lift them all and scatter them
into the sky, too high for definition,
turning blankets of grey cloud a murky yellow
like the edges of boiled egg yolks, somewhere
between grime and daffodil, headlights
dispersed over rain showers. Humans
look on and wonder if they will ever see
the sky blur and bloom like this again.
Like buttercups. Like the second coming.Stunned by the spectacle, the leaves finally
live up to their name and throw themselves
at the earth’s feet, worshipping the sun with their
bronzed backs arched, before being spun like
caramel into the sky, into heaven.Summer? What summer? Now is the time
for storms, a hailing of autumn, the opening
of winter’s doors. -
Notes on losing myself
I wrote the below passage when I got to my desk this morning because on the drive to work I had been thinking about my uncle who doesn’t have long left with us, and that made me think about my brother and all the things I don’t know and don’t dare ask about his passing, and naturally my thoughts turned to myself, so here we are. And I hesitated before sharing this because even though I have been writing this stuff here for a while now, it still seems like maybe it’s weird or oversharing, but above all I feel like it is important and we should talk about mental and emotional health after cancer, even if people don’t want us to, even if nobody else is, even if nobody is listening. So here we are.
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Scrape
I scrape a poem from the edges of my brain
carve the crusty consonants from the
crevices of my lobes, slide the spatula
beneath the remaining residue from whatever
once resided. I peel the skin from the corners,
pick the flaky film from these four grey walls,
soap up the sides to get the stubborn sticky
bits to budge, make room for more material –
delivery date unknown, cautious of the contents
should they be something better left uninvestigated.
I clear the crumbs with my dustpan and brush,
settle for structured silliness amid silence, make
a mess like a child, call it art, with enough
confidence to not be wrong.
