The tumor took
over half her jaw.
He points to the x-ray
circling the dark spot
with the cap of his pen.
Her head looks barely
bigger than a walnut.
I try to find something
to compare the tumor to,
but it stays a tumor. It grew
so quickly. She wasn’t in pain
long, just a few days of drool
and no appetite, a bit of blood
on the chin. When she goes,
it’s hard to know the moment.
They light a candle. I don’t cry.
I’ve learned the danger of vulnerability
in front of men I do not know.
I stopped crying at funerals when
I lost a love and someone hugged me
a little too long, a little too tight.
A grieving woman is still a target.
If she does not cry, she is cold,
if she does, she needs consoling.
I grieve quietly, in private.
Maybe I hold on to things too long.
I reach for ways to bind my wounds
faster. At my grandmother’s funeral,
it became a joke among my uncles
of who would cry first. My mom
gave a eulogy while they shed tears,
her own never falling. We tell each other
it’s better this way, they were sick,
it was time. Later, I heard her
through a closed door.
My husband goes on misty-eyed drive,
I clean up the litter box, the cat food,
the crate. There is always more
to do. In the shower I make lists,
think about the day ahead, anything
to keep me from falling apart,
becoming the water around me.
