Our book of birds

         

i.

Lately, lately

we have hungered for news
Nora's bones
Dan's words
or the completeness of birds

Somewhere, someone
pines for
but we
still long for
or birds
their shocking whole

The loved are still
they are so far from
what we can
the human strain
the sloppiness of cats

Just give me birds

I've decided to lead with tonight's poem. These pieces are, after all, my main reason for blogging. At least I think they are. So it might be wise to put the poem first.

So, this piece is the opening one for the poem cycle that I think of as, our book of birds. And, from tonight on, I hope to present the cycle pieces in order. The cycle is complete. That is to say I've written all of it that I'm going to, I think, but I lived with it for so long, through such a difficult and even mythic phase of my life, that it feels good to be sharing it, piece by piece, with...well, with you.

Tonight, I'm very tired and I don't think that I can say much else. It's been a wonderful day. My friend Adam drove Lulu and me to Ocean Beach and we walked along the water. It was a long drive today - Saturday on the Bay Bridge, and I kept remarking on how long it was, which of course made it longer. But we made it and it was worth it. The Pacific Ocean is still there! Honest! Even though I haven't been over to keep an eye on it for, I don't know, months. It's still there and it still comes right up to the beach! Imagine my delight!

Adam claims that he swam in this ocean when he was a child. On a regular basis. Without a wet suit! So he says. Repeatedly! I would like to say that he's a known liar, since that would explain his behavior. But he's not. Not at all. So how to understand such a thing? I just don't know. Oh, sweet mysteries of life.

I must sleep. I am already sleeping and the dreams are getting mixed up with...whatever this purports to be. The Xeloda is slowly seeping out of my system and I must sleep.

You sleep well too.

Good-night.

Number One

Nicky says that I should start a blog and post one of my poems every day. Or did I say that, to Nicky, casually, over Korean BBQ at a weekday lunch, or out on campus while we watched Lulu chasing squirrels at Faculty Glade? Well, whichever. Whatever. Whoever. Nicky's the one who knows what a blog is and how to start one, I'm the one who seems to have something to say...constantly

The point is that Nicky, whether he started the idea or not, Nicky is the one who wouldn't let the idea go. He's the one who sat on my couch on Tuesday and Googled Blogger, worked his way to the set-up page, and then handed me the laptop and said, "Ok, now, you just need a name." And there was no real escape. I was fried from the chemo, the new chemo, the chemo that I call cruel and that my beloved oncologist, Dr. Jim, has, since then, just yesterday in fact, declared me free from. (Well, go ahead, you think it's an ill-constructed sentence, you take it on, work it out. I'd be grateful.) He took one look at the soles of my poor feet and said...

So, anyway, on Tuesday, I was fried and Efren was in the back, painting trim before I lose all the window frames to dry rot in the laundry area, and Nicky had brought me Thai noodles from the Thai place that Pat taught me about, and I had been able to eat just enough to feel almost human again, even though every bite was a small torture for my chemo-shredded mouth—Xeloda does have a thing for mucus membranes, it seems. So, what could I do? I set up a Blogspot and here I am.

Just a note here, by the way, in all fairness to Xeloda, Dr. Jim, when I called it cruel, said that, "Many women find it completely benign, Melanie, believe it or not. It seems to run the gamut from A to Z. Unfortunately, you seem to be a Z." Ah, yes, a Z. And not for the first time. But my advice, if you are struggling with metastasized breast cancer, and your doctor says, "Well, I think we should try Xeloda." My advice? Try it! We have to keep trying, right?

More on this later, and it's a pretty amazing story so far, if I do say so myself—her2 neu positive, hormone-receptor negative metastasis in the liver; four and a half years of living with mets, so far, and two years of that chemo-free, so far. Honest, no kidding. No, I know, none of us can believe it, either, but I just keep limping along—

So, I do want to explain who Nicky is, and Lauren, who hasn't even appeared yet, but who wanted me to blog about who I am and that I have cancer, and some of the things that I think about AS WELL as printing one of my poems each day. And there's so much to say about living with cancer and living with dying and all that, BUT...

I just spilled a large glass of iced club soda in my bed. Again. And I'm actually pretty tired. So, until tomorrow, I will just post one of my bird poems. They were written as a cycle, these bird poems, and this is not officially the first of the cycle, but it is the one that has provided the name of this blog, and the url. And I sort of love it. A lot. So, here it is and sweet good night to you.

Today's Poem

we watch

the birds

dream

in the grander scheme

of things

Saturday afternoon

the olive-sided flycatcher

(ridiculous as that may seem)

the great pee-wee (that can't be here)

a brown towhee (that is)

a house finch (always)

waiting for a twinge

a wise complaint

living after dying

they needed me

living after dying

I thought they needed me

call and response

when crows aren't flying

I want, I want to see him again

just one more time