He is warm, tolerant, selfless.
He values education over power,
and earns the respect some demand.
He is the sort of man I hope to be.
Cancer: a proliferation of poison,
a robber of dignity,
a squanderer of vitality, money, time.
A plague—multiplying, intensifying, destroying.
Worse than its symptoms?
Worse than the side-effects of its treatment—
coughing, nausea, fatigue, infection?
Worse than a head pillaged of hair?
Worse than weeks, months,years
spent suffering?
The knowledge that it never had to be.
Wisps of smoke
curl through my memories.
When I was young,
the acrid fumes burned my nose.
Later, cigarettes were the scent of comfort;
Baba was near.
Now, tobacco smells of regret,
of slow decline,
of encroaching death.
The new medicines are
why we came to America,
Baba, Mama, and me.
They are meant to help, to heal.
I am not sure they are doing their job.
It is possible we have traveled around the world for nothing.
