Today's Poem: Radiation and the Rose of Sharon

 

Nothing cures insomnia like radiation.

After 30 sessions of IMRT, I’m tired by noon,

Exhausted by three, and asleep by 10. (Won’t mention

Incontinence. Can’t write a poem about that!)

 

In spite of it all, I’m ridiculously

Happy. A Rose of Sharon’s

Splendid vulnerability is enough.

Majesty doesn't survive? In a while

 

All that’s left is a pale green fist

Clenched below where beauty was--

Flora shall return spectacularly dressed!

(Perhaps not. Nevertheless.)_

 

Although flowers become dust,

I’m like a lark freed from a net;

Wings about to die (perhaps later

Than sooner) still thankfully fly—

 

Whose eye is on the Rose of Sharon?

Nobody? Somebody who isn‘t/is?

Who knows. The garden is bare now.

Nevertheless, I believe.

                                         Thomas Dorsett