From the Archives...
Signing Sympathy
The ritual keeps us breathing
from biopsy to biopsy. The lump out,
or the whole breast; changing skylines
of loss.
In the early days, disaster trumped
disease, but there’s only so much
to say about a car smashed on tracks,
a honeymoon in a hurricane.
At some point, I stopped listening.
I wanted to take my name back
from the card’s ink ladder, cross it out
like a misdiagnosis, hush the talk
that would have quieted anyway,
once the envelope slid into the mailbox,
red flag raised like a fist.