Trilogy for James
Deborah L Schultz MD
May
Motorcycle helmet
Center stage on your
Window ledge.
Off to the sides,
Flowers,
Pretty yes,
From the girls.
The belly pain is gone,
The expanding hematoma
At last tamponaded
by its own mass
and countless units
of cryo, platelets,
packed RBCs
But I just fell out of bed
Coagulopathy from metastatic
Prostate cancer
Words that have no meaning
My PSA is better.
The helmet lies.
You haven’t driven—anything-Since February
Not with the radiation, chemo
The wife won’t let me
But maybe in July.
Maybe in July.
JUNE
The call at three am
With ER doc almost apologetic-Pain enough
to bring the stoic
To his knees—
Bleeding again,
Hematoma expanding relentlessly,
Displacing kidney,
They tried chemo again.
No hope remains
His oncologist gentle
In the telling.
No magic potions,
No wizardry of radiation remains.
So sorry. So very sorry.
I don’t think I’ll thank you in the obituary.
Home with hospice,
Dilaudid PCA.
A standing ovation
At your cousin’s funeral
Though they didn’t know
You crawled the steps
To make it.
No motorcycle ride.
Not now.
Not ever.
JULY
You welcome us into your home
With slurred speech, weaker now;
Are relieved with our Annunciation—
No not a stroke, all medication related.
We change the recipe for pain relief
Stay awhile, I didn’t think doctors made house calls.
And so we visit.
Your handiwork covers the walls.
Hand-hewn
Framed pictures of your children’s journeys
From babyhood to graduation.
Except the one, he died a baby.
We talk of state fairs,
Your wife’s blue ribbon sweaters;
The countless cards wishing well,
The raffle that they had at work.
You are loved.
Death eased you from this world
This Monday, July night.
The earth vibrated
As you shifted,
Drove, that Harley
Heavenward.
Maybe in July.
Deborah L Schultz MD