The Cancer Patient

- A Belated Father's Day Poem

I rarely wore the silver watch my father bought me
because it felt so heavy on my wrist.

During the early morning hours of the recovery ward,
we patted the back of his hand and walked towards the park.

We ended up climbing some playground equipment
made of interconnected bars and chords.

As we contorted ourselves through the darkened apparatus,
I imagined ourselves as heavy hunks of cancer –

Where we each took turns politely excusing ourselves
from the depths of a patient’s grateful body.

Then, I saw that my watch had lost a heavy hunk of its silver band,
and I felt an unexpected rush of nostalgia for the thing.

At long last, the accessory felt like an extension of myself,
and it reminded me of those fortuitous times

when losing a piece of something you love
can help your family hang on.