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Enter to win the Songs from the Well revised and Expanded edition, in paperback, to be release on Yom Kippur, 9/8/13, along with my latest book, Yom Kippur as Manifest in an Approaching Dorsal Fin.
I know this is not what she set out to teach me, but I am grateful for the lesson about life, even if it cost my mother her own.
Posted by Adamus on July 7, 2013 in Culture, Family, Poster, Social, Uncategorized
I am forty-eight. Not old by a long shot. But still, this year, as I begin to think of myself as fifty, as half-way, I and my friends, my close friends, those long friends, those who have been with me for decades, for lifetimes, and those with whom I cannot recount decades but feel as though lifetimes have been spent in their splendid company, with those friends I have begun discussing who goes first.
Perhaps it is the death of my wife nearly two years ago. The shaking out of any sense of permanence and security. The blowing of the ram’s horn, the clanging of the cymbals, that shocks off the clinging illusion that anything lasts but love.
Perhaps it is the suicides, both successful and non, that have surrounded me. The conscious choice to leave on one’s own terms.
Perhaps it is just age.
I have been asked to perform a wedding. It is an honour and a joy and I will happily bundle myself up to Boulder to help write vows and join Joyce and her Ryan in wedded (we hope) bliss. I also performed the naming ceremony for her daughter, my god-daughter, Sloan.
She told me, you know, I have you in my will. I knew why. She has it that I am supposed to do her funeral as well.
Joyce is younger than me by about seven years. She does Pilates, Jujitsu, dances, lifts weights, fights tigers, climbs poles, eats nails, and I think every bit of her gorgeousness is made of warm, soft and cuddly indestructibility. Near as perfect a human female body as I think anyone could imagine, like an android from a science fiction story. Heinlein’s Friday. And she wants me to do her funeral. Barring a (lucky?) strike by a space toilet fallen from orbit or a sudden disease (like I don’t know those happen) I can’t see her going first. I told her so.
“Well, you’d better quite the Pilates and Jujitsu and start eating crap then, because otherwise, I’m pretty sure I’m going first.”
This morning I sent her a text. “You know… You are the only person who knows everything. Did you know that? You had better NOT go first. No one else knows all the stories.”
It’s true, though I’m not sure how this happened. We are very much alike, she and I, in so many ways that nothing I say surprises her. Nothing. She understands it all. She always has. Never a laugh except at our similarities and how funny humans are. Never a shame, or a judgement, or even a question. She knows it all. All about the kids, their stories growing up, about Lee and love and life with her and after her. She knows who I am and how I am and loves me anyway.
Someday, I will be on my deathbed, unless I’m on the grill of a truck, of course, or inside a bear, and there will be stories. That is a good thing. How sad to be dying and be, one would hope, surrounded by loving family and friends, and have no stories. How terrible for the children to have had no embarrassments to recount, no mishaps to retell, no tall tales to let grow over time. It will never be said of me that I worked, came home, slept, and did it again. No, there will be stories.
When Lee died, when we had her memorial, it was stories. All night. The all night slumber pool party memorial and story-a-thon. I told so many. So did Lee’s mom, and sister. And Craig, and others. And Joyce had her share. She told them in the living room, she told them sitting with the kids, Sef, Alek, Ari, on the kitchen floor, each story leaving their faces a bit more red. She told them as we all divested ourselves of our various bits of cloth and jumped into the pool. She told them over drinks, and breakfast, and whispered them to me when I could not sleep. She knows the stories.
And she wants me to preside over her funeral. No, dear. No. She needs to tell the stories. So the kids can pass them on. So everyone can laugh, or sigh, or cry, or shake their heads, or wonder how on Earth I made it that far.
And she wants me to preside over her funeral. Joyce, I think you shall have to preside over mine. And everyone better laugh. I know they will.
I had pulled the car out of the garage and set up a chair. Months earlier I had purchased a Norelco family hair cutting kit, and electric razor and attachments, for next to nothing at a garage sale. I had no idea why, but I brought it home, and now, now, it was plugged in and ready to be used.
The chemotherapy had left your hair in clumps. It fell into the shower drain, left bits on the pillow, left itself on the couch. Each bit that fell, you cried. I watched as you turned once, as I held you up in the shower to see your hair on the drain. Out of the shower, you stood, facing the mirror, clutching at your hair, pulling it out in clumps, tears falling, falling into the sink with the strands from between your fingers.
Hats you didn’t like. The scarves you used have been all given away.
You said you wanted your head shaved. I offered. You said no. You didn’t want me doing it. You didn’t want that to be the memory of my hand. You wanted Unena to do it. Only she would do.
We were sitting on the couches in the living room. We wanted to go out, the three of us. It would be one of the last nights we would go out, you and I. Maybe second to last. But first, your hair.
How did it come to this? Who once was the patient, now helping care for you. Who once you treated, now holding you up, walking with you, one of the few people you trust.
And she fell in love with you. And you with she. And I with her. What a strange circumstance. You, with barely a female friend all your life—you, straight as an arrow—seemingly, obviously, so in love. And it bothered me not one bit. That a blessing of love would come to you, with so little time left, made me smile. How much bigger our hearts were now that our hearts were breaking.
A folding chair in the garage. Craig’s chair. The one he left here for himself to use, unfolded, set by the open garage door. You, helped to the chair, sitting. A towel around your shoulders, on your lap. The razor plugged in. Hesitation. And she starts.
I can barely look at the razor as it glides over your scalp, and look down instead. Hair falling. Falling to your lap. Falling at your feet. Falling to the floor in soft puffs, blowing as the breeze would catch it, swirling around the garage and, then, out the door.
What did not swirl out of the garage, I swept out. Out, over the drive way. Out, into the grass. Let the birds have it, you said. Let them. What good to hold on?
Others might have saved your hair. But we discussed it. Decided no. Let it blow. Let it sail. Let it be carried by the wind, by birdwings and raindrops. Let it become the stuff of nests, work into the soil, seeds will grow, eggs will hatch and new life will come into the world nestled in your hair, and your hair will be all around us, around me, surrounding your home, in the ground and the trees, in the water, always there, always there, like you. Always there. Some of you, always there.
And the razor stopped. And all I could do was kiss your head. But I think Unena got there first. And that was OK. It was her hand that had done the deed, performed the mitzva, loosened further your already tenuous connection to this world.
I have a picture of the two of you. A month later. The last time you were out. The night you made her promise to take care of me. The night you made me promise to take care of her. Your heads are pressed together. Your smile. You smiled like that when you held your granddaughter. You smiled like that when you saw me. You smiled like that when your children came to see you after long absence. In less than a month you would leave us, and I don’t think I ever saw you smile quite that big.
Posted by Adamus on March 14, 2013 in Culture, Family, Social
Tags: brain, brain cancer, cancer, friendship, hair, Lee, love, razor
Loving someone, even deeply and completely, does not automatically confer a sprinkling of pixie dust that creates compatibility. It takes work. And even then, work will not make two people fit who do not. Like sanding, it may take off rough edges, but will not make something into a new shape. That would be to make a new person in a shape that fits. Such love is not for the person, but an image or ideal, an imagining. Work will not make a miss-sized or miss-shaped shoe fit. You may get it on, but it won’t get you anywhere.
There have been a spate of “Love me as I am” graphics on the Internet lately. The latest says “The person who really loves you sees what a mess you can be, how moody you can get, and how hard you are to handle. But still wants you in their life.” Bad punctuation aside, this is a load of trite, treacly tripe not worth the pixels it takes to render it. The “hard to handle” part of the poster is the part I find most, well… hard to handle. Sure, no one is perfect. As one friend said, we are “Perfectly imperfect works in progress.” But the poster isn’t saying that – the poster is saying this : “Hey, even if I’m a complete and utter basket-case that makes you crazy, so inconsistent that you cannot even build trust in me, if you love me, you’ll put up with whatever the hell I do to you.”
There is a quote that has been going around that is attributed to Marilyn Monroe. “I’m selfish, impatient and a little insecure. I make mistakes, I am out of control and at times hard to handle. But if you can’t handle me at my worst, then you sure as hell don’t deserve me at my best.” Let’s look at this. That’s a bit like saying “You love me, so I’m going to feed you fishsticks. If you don’t like eating fishsticks, you sure as hell don’t deserve to eat fresh salmon.” What we should be saying, both men and women, to our lovers, is this. “You love me and you deserve my best all the time. I love you and want you to have my best. But sometimes, like all people, I’m at my worse. And thank you for dealing as best as you can with that as well.”
Love doesn’t mean putting up with abuse. And love should mean doing our best to modify the inconsistencies, the moods, so there is stability. Without stability, nothing can be built.
Look at is this way -these posters usually come with graphics that have beaches, and hearts, and flowers, denoting femininity in some way, so we know it is aimed at men and regarding women. What if we changed the graphics to denote something that is culturally understood as masculine. For the sake of argument, perhaps a garage. Or a beer can. Telling women that, as a guy, I can be unstable, inconsistent, moody, snappish, and hard to handle but, if you love me, you’ll put up with my lack of desire to control myself, lack of interest in seeing how my behavior affects you, and whatever nonsense I dish out. How far would that get?
And a guy who puts up with that, no matter how much he loves a woman? And, to be fair, any woman who puts up with that from a man? We’d say they have a lack of self-respect. Maybe they don’t love themselves or respect themselves enough. Or perhaps they feel they can’t do better or don’t deserve to be treated better.
These posters perpetuate an idea that any feminist, female or male, should rail against. The idea that a woman isn’t responsible for her behavior and, if a man loves her, he’ll just deal with it. That men are, by duty, stable and consistent – the emotional anchor in a relationship – and that women are creatures of emotion only and may be absolved of responsibility for upheavals in a relationship. Upheavals that men must simply weather. It’s time for these posters to go and for women to stop posting them. They owe it to their daughters. They owe it to their sons. They owe it to their lovers. They owe it to those who fought for women to stand on equal footing. They owe it to themselves.
Posted by Adamus on March 13, 2013 in Culture, psychology, Social
Tags: facebook, friendship, husband, love, poster, relationships, romance, spouse, wife
I wrote this about a week ago.
I posted it that night.
At least I thought I had posted it. I have never had trouble posting to my blog before, but this ended up, each time, in the Drafts folder. I asked my editor, who has access to my blog, for help.
He read it. He said he was glad it seemed stuck as a draft. He was afraid that giving this voice might make it become so.
I erased it.
I have learned, through years of teaching and using narrative therapy, that the best way to move an emotional state out is to bring it out as fully as possible. Putting it into words, as fully, as accurately, with as much detail, emotion, and directness as possible, is one of the best ways to do that. It also means it is then outside, not being repeated in one’s head, all day, all night, on and on.
My editor showed it to my psychologist. Dr. Sarah Arnett. She explained to him that writing about it or talking about it, was far from dangerous: not talking about it was the danger. And, as scary as it is, people who feel this way must be allowed to talk about it. Not told it is wrong. Not given trite reasons to go on or have clichés foisted upon them, not told they have so much to live for, not told there are people who would miss them. They know this. But none of that helps. They need to give voice to the sorrow, or the anger, so it can come out.
My friend Joyce, she got it. She and I laughed one evening over the ways we’d end it. How we could do it without it looking like we had any real part in it. It was good to know someone understood.
So here it is. After checking with the kids, letting them know it was OK, here it is.
Maybe reading this, more people will know it is OK to listen, without fear, to a friend or loved one who feels this way. It is not a plan. It is a feeling. It is loss and longing and anger and sorrow looking for cessation, surcease, palliation. It is not life that wants the end, but the pain.
Maybe reading this, more people who feel this way will know it is OK to say it, to write it, instead of letting it grow inside, instead of letting it eat one up, take over. Instead of doing it.
The moon doesn’t change as I walk. It doesn’t move. Not perceptibly. The wind pushes steadily in the direction of the incoming waves so that I must push back to keep myself at the shoreline. A little struggle, a bit of resistance, friction, is good, if it is tangible. If it is clear.
I know, over time, the moon will rise. I can watch it as much as I like, but I’ll never perceive the movement. Yet, over time, move it will, higher and higher, then set again, and be gone.
Over the last two years, if I look back, I can see where I’ve been, what has changed. The pace is, perhaps, glacial. But I think, at last, it, too, is setting. I don’t want to watch it anymore.
I have a good life. A wonderful life. I have been the luckiest of men. I have, in the real sense of what one needs, wanted for nothing. I want for nothing now. I am surrounded by goodness and love. A splendid family, children anyone would be proud off, friends anyone would be blessed with. I was married for nearly thirty years to the most wonderful of women. There is nothing wrong. But I don’t want it.
I don’t want to linger anymore. I don’t want to just wait for the day I can see her again, or discover there is nothing to see, but rest, and darkness and nothingness. I can wait around, and just be. But there seems little reason. No motivation.
I know my friends, my family will differ with this, but the last year and a half has proven life goes on, that things happen, and we continue. I’m just choosing that I don’t wish too. My kids are off and fine and my wife is gone. So, no need.
I promised her I’d go and be happy. It may be the only promise to her I didn’t keep. I’m trying to. Leaving feels more like keeping it than the intangible struggle of the day to day. The struggle to be, to find reasons to wake up.
I don’t want to hear about the little pleasures. I know about them. Flowers. Hugs, sunrises. But the last few nights, I have had dreams: sitting and talking with my Lee. All night, just talking, like the best friends we are. And that is all I can want.
I promised her, as well, I’d not join a monastery. That I’d not become a Buddhist monk. I’ll keep that promise. I promised I’d not allow myself to spend my life alone. But I am a shy creature, and do not venture out by myself, do not mingle, meet, join, talk to people I don’t know. I don’t party or partake or parlay or participate in things social. So I am left with a second promise it appears I cannot keep.
Being alone is not a problem. Lack of contact, feeling isolated—that is. I can feel it. And to not feel it, I have to deny it.
I don’t want to deaden anything with alcohol, or take pills. I don’t want to not feel. But it seems most feelings are disappearing on their own. And I am left with…what? A sad nostalgia of belonging to a place and person not here. A feeling for which English has no word.
I’m going day by day. Making plans for the very near future only. Living today for what I need to do today. Tomorrow will be for today. The next day will be for today. Only today. Give me a task, I’ll do it. Why not? For now.
Real plans I have none. No goals. Nothing to aspire to. And I have no real plans to end anything, but each night, I wonder, how do I not wake when the sun rises? How can my sleep be one from which I do not wake? How can my dream go on and on?
Suicide is not illegal. Only doing something to oneself that is obviously designed to lead to termination in the very short term. One may not poison oneself with a vial but one may with chemicals, knowing that time is all it takes. One may not do without food or water, but one may choose things which will hasten one’s end. One may not leap but one may walk too close. And one may slip.
I am taking excellent care of myself. I may be in the best shape of my life. And getting better. My life is simple. I do nothing that may immediately lead to my leaving. I do nothing that anyone can look at, can point to, can identify as a cause, of it being my fault. So I exercise, eat well, rest. But neither do I do anything to prolong my stay. I no longer put on my seat belt. I am careless. I pay little attention. Most of the time, I am just thinking, how much more sweet to sleep.
I have no plan. Just opportunity.
I grew tired of people saying things were God’s will, that it was time, that there is a plan. Fine, I say, then. If something happens, it happens. It was a plan. Whatever happens, if I was supposed to take some strange comfort in there having been a plan for my wife’s hideous, painful death, then those who believe such can feel the same way about whatever happens next as well.
I don’t want anyone to suffer. And I was told, over and over, not to care so much about others that I let myself suffer as a result. OK. Now I’m listening.
I was told I wasn’t needed by others as much as I thought. That I could live my life for myself, for my own desires. I said don’t try to convince me of that. I said it would be a bad day if ever I believed that. Now, I believe it.
I’m tired of it. I just want it to end. The day-to-day drudge of just waiting until I see her again. I used to feel that tomorrow would be fine, or next week, next year, or forty years. It didn’t matter. But now it does. I wasn’t meant to do this by myself and I want out.
I have cancelled my appointments. I don’t need them. No doctors. No psychologist. Let the appointments be for someone for whom they will be of some use. Someone who wants to stay.
I asked my daughter once, after she tried to take her own life, to promise she would not hurt herself. She said she could not make that kind of promise. I understood. I never asked again. My psychologist asked me to promise I would not hurt myself. I could not make that promise.
Sometime, soon, I can hope, emotion and opportunity will come together, for a moment.
Tomorrow I will go for a walk. Next week, I have a call to make, and a book I might put together. That is the extent of my life’s plans.
The moon tonight is full. I can look at it all night, and it will never seem to change. It will be like that, forever. Or so it seems. And that is enough.
2/27/2013
Posted by Adamus on March 3, 2013 in Culture, Family, philosophy, psychology, Social, Suicide, Writing
Tags: cancer, change, despair, despondent, grief, Lee, moon, Suicide, time
Don’t be something you are not. Don’t do things just because you think it is what someone else will want, or so that person won’t be angry, or sad, or lonely. Not for anyone. Don’t change anything for anyone just because you think it’ll make someone happy. It is ingenuine. It is a form of dishonesty. The other person will never know if it is really your desire or just you doing what you think someone else wants. It will end in distrust, even if your intentions were good.
How you are is not your fault. Your past, your habits, your reactions. None of it. Until that very moment when you find something you dislike or want to change. Then it is your fault if it continues, your responsibility if it remains. The moment you find something you want to change, it is no longer blamable on the past.
Don’t go to sleep angry. You’ve heard that before. But it is good advice. Don’t. Not at a spouse, or your kid, or your boss, or the government, or the world. Breathe and let it go. You might not wake up. Don’t go to sleep angry. And when you make up, wake up to see a smile, or the bright sun, or to falling rain, or to something that is sweet, because it may be the last time you wake, may be the last day you see. Fill your day with harmony and sweetness, because you may not see the next day. Why have anything on your last day that isn’t sweet? If anything gets in the way of harmony and sweetness, change how you feel about it or remove it.
Even pain can be sweet. But drama never is.
People love you and have helped you. Love and help them. Be there for them. Even if you have the short end of the bargain from time to time. But don’t let gratitude, or love, or fear, yours or theirs, hold you hostage. If you do, the relationship is built on something ingenuine.
Be you. The best you you can be. If you like something about you, or if it works for you, don’t change it. Not for anyone or anything. If there is something you don’t like, or if it doesn’t work for you, change it, no matter what others feel about it. You get this shot at this life only.
Posted by Adamus on February 8, 2013 in Family, philosophy, psychology, Social
Tags: change, fear, love, relationships
This is the first poem of mine I had ever heard read aloud. I had wondered about my poetry, whether it was any good or not. Whether it was worthy of publication in any way. I had been reading the works of my favorite poets, Piercy and Ciardi and Millay, wondering if I would ever like my own work as much. No, I was sure. No.
One late night, after a campfire and dinner with friends, driving from Jonesville back home to Gainesville, Florida, the radio on a local station, we listened to a show with a variety of music and poetry and prose. A poem came on, introduced not at all, without a title, and I listened, mind fixed solidly on the words and rhythm. This, this, I said to Lee, this is what I wish my work sounded like. I wish I could write like this.
A stanza or two in, I said this. Lee elbowed me, said, “but,” and I asked her to let me finish listening to it first. She elbowed me again and said, “That IS your poem.” I believe this was followed by an eye-roll. And, yes, indeed, it was.
And it was as I wanted it to sound. Said what I wanted a poem to say. I had written something I would want to listen to.
And there went my excuses.
Recognizing Kali in a Young Girl
Sitting here by the side of a two-lane
watching no cars go by
and steam rise in plumes
from the gaping hood of my automobile,
my daughter and I on this lonely shoulder
sitting, waiting for help.
Waiting for assistance.
Standing to stare into the engine
in a testosterone ritual predating cars
and trucks and carriages,
carts and wheels,
I imagine an early progenitor of my gender
staring intently into the mouth of a horse
checking teeth, gums, breath,
looking at the legs and feeling he wanted to kick something
but having no tires available
grabbed the beast’s cannon bone with a sturdy hand,
checking for splints.
Bubbling and boiling,
maybe this car will never move again
and I’ll have no reason to sit within its space
confined with hope of forced conversation with the little girl
too old to want to talk with her father
and too innocent to know why.
Turning away from the beast
I look to the field:
wildflowers blooming
tall, short, colored like air and sun,
water and earth, dancing in the wind
with my daughter, swaying and swirling
with my daughter.
The old rabbis have said,
or so the Hassidic recount,
not a blade of grass grows,
not a leaf falls
that an angel does not make it so.
Classes of angels,
Cherubim, Seraphim,
cloud angels and insect angels,
grass angels and tree angels.
Angels, then, for sunlight and rain
and for home cooking and pizza joints.
Angels for taxes and funerals and sex.
Angels for car engines.
Angels for little girls.
And there she is,
crouching among the blooms,
picking iris and narcissus.
Harvesting angels.
(This poem, along with many others, can be found in various anthologies as well as my own book, The Phoenix and the Dragon: Poems from the Alchemical Transformation (Smithcraft Press), available, along with my other books, Tellstones: Runic Divination in the Welsh Tradition, and Bud the Spud, at your local bookstore, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo and elsewhere, for you reading needs, whether you like to hold books in your hands or read them on tablets or phones of Kindles or Nooks or, goodness gracious – so many options. You can find my author profile on Amazon and please find me as well at GoodReads.)
Posted by Craig R. Smith on February 7, 2013 in Culture, Family, Poetry, Religion, Social
Tags: angel, angels, childhood, daughter, daughters, food, hasidic, jews, judaism, pizza, poems, poetry, sex
Hi, Mr. T____,
I have read through about half of the script for T_____ T_____ o_ M_____ a__ M_____. I had thought, from your description, and from the first thirteen pages of your graphic novel, that it was tales. As in multiple. Perhaps it branches off into related tales. As a structure, that is something I could appreciate.
The second story, as a separate entity, is really a second chapter, seemingly, of the first (perhaps only) story. Not so much Tales of the Crypt meets Tarantino, as you had described it, but as as as… and there is where words fail me. Because I generally don’t watch horror films or films with dismemberment or films where there is stark, continuous, senseless brutality.
The second chapter, the elements of necrophilia, the cocaine use coupled with sex and violence toward women, left me, and you can call me sensitive if you like, really unable to read further. I stopped reading as the cop was contemplating having sex with the headless corpse, and had trouble even getting that far.
Controversial material, we can handle. Material of a sexual nature is no problem. But try as I might, I could not find any redeeming qualities to this. So, as far as promotion, I don’t know what on Earth we’d do because I could not suggest anyone read this. If I found this in my daughter’s room, I’d wonder what was wrong with her. If I found this in my son’s room, I’m ask him to seek help. If I published this, I think they’d ask me to seek counseling. In other words, I can’t stand behind the work as having value and, hence, they’d wonder what happened to my integrity. Or if I had a stroke.
I can suggest finding a specialty publisher. Perhaps there is one that specializes in snuff comics. Or Lulu.com, where you pay a fee to publish and it is at least out there for anyone who wishes to look for this sort of material. Then, you can find where those folks read, forums maybe, bus stations, or back alleys, and post about your book. Perhaps places that have posters of Anton LaVey. By the way, LaVey’s last words were, “What have I done, there is something very wrong”
I do want to point out that your dialogue is realistic. You seem to have a handle on how people talk to, and sometimes, at or parallel to each other. I can really hear it in the panels where the cop is snorting cocaine off the naked girl’s ass, slapping her in the head each time she tries to turn over. At least, I imagine that is what the dialogue would sound like. Since I have never imagined that before, I’ll have to take your word for it.
If you do any different material, I’d be more than happy to look at it.
Adam
Adam Byrn Tritt, MEd, LMT, CHt, MSU, Mensch-in-Chief for Smithcraft Press
Posted by Adamus on November 30, 2012 in Books, psychology, Social, Writing
Tags: books, graphic, letter, murder, publishing, rejection, sex, tritt, violence
There are no scars I can see,
but we know they are there.
The flesh is warm and
tender though beneath
it feels different
than I would have imagined,
I suppose.
Years before
at a youth conference
I was a mentor for the teens
and my partner in class
was a young
lady of forty,
I suppose.
Margot had a close crop of hair
and we talked about imperfections
as we sat on the floor,
she on one side
I on the other
in a circle of kids
all there because they didn’t belong
and so was I.
Margot’s turn came
and she reached into her shirt,
pulled out her left breast and
threw it to me.
Dear Margot,
this is not a normal introduction
is what I said
and the kids laughed
the shock away
as I squeezed lightly
the translucent bag,
jostled it between my fingers
making a mental comparison
which could be seen on my face,
I suppose,
and the kids laughed
as I passed the breast to the left.
Dear Margot,
may I compare
is what I asked
and she said yes, with a smile
I walked the few feet as
she pulled her bra out from her sleeve,
I squeezed lightly
and jostled it between my fingers
making a mental comparison
which could be seen on my face,
I suppose,
and the kids laughed
while passing the breast to the left.
I wouldn’t have imagined,
I suppose,
anything,
because being here
with you, in this way,
feels normal, fine and right,
but who could have seen it coming
as I squeeze lightly,
jostling them between my fingers,
making no mental comparison,
which you can see on my face,
I suppose,
until I kiss your warm flesh
and my face disappears.
Posted by Adamus on October 15, 2012 in Culture, Poetry, Social
Tags: adam, breast, breast cancer, bud, cancer, chemotherapy, dragon, friend, komen, love, mamogram, phoenix, radiation, reconstruction, saline, sex, silicone, soul, spud, tellstones, tritt
Adam Byrn Tritt