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THE ACTIVE CHILD is a poem about parental responsibility during a siege of cancer, a cancer poem which is part of the Genghis Lotus Poetry Collection, a selection of poems free to read online. Webmaster for this site is poet Hugh Cook, born in Britain, educated in New Zealand, and the author of, amongst other works, the fantasy series Chronicles of an Age of Darkness.
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The active child is, for our purposes, Death's refutation, Chaos rebutting entropy. She is flamboyant with invention, Alive With starbursts of astonishment. Her creation is blamsplam, Bursting from her seamlets, Going forth to conquer. From her ninety-nine infinities She diasporas, Populating her planet, Generating Phantasmal demographics, Sherbet cosmologies. The active child is a crowd, a contingent, A mob scene in action. One and none makes ninety. My lethal conditions, My unappeased fingernail syndrome, My afabricated blotting paper psychosis, My case of turnip's scurf and lugwump's mound, Fall off their get-well-soon cards And forget themselves. She cleos her patras and is empress, Commanding, demanding, Coming, like it or not. She is life at the crescendo, Her own firebird suite, Her own exultant fanfare for herself. Energy in excess is her personal trademark, Her patent the burning moment, Her logo the living sun. If you want the use of the four wild winds, She requires your royalties. She is her own one-woman motorbike gang, Marauding flowers On her titchy little three-wheeled plastic bike. She is Miss Trophy Triumph, Miss Tomato Thief, Mistress of the flower-stealing grin. She is someone's daughter, The one who continues, The one who does not die. She is mine. She is the intolerable demand, the no-can-cope, Forcing a larger existence, Like it or not. She is life beyond cancer. Caught in the incandescence of her expanding star I have not the option to be cinders. Fortunately, there is help. Grinding up the steak was a great idea For the delinquent daughter. For this and many more — You know the score — A truly thank you. |
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May be photocopied for classroom use |
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Paperback Book or US $5 PDF file |
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CANCER POEMS: poetry about having cancer, about pressing on with life, about facing death and thinking about mortality, and about suffering damage from radiation therapy, this being in the form of brain damage and partial blindness. Don't miss the praise poem for Saddam Hussein, SADDAM IS GUILTY
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CANCER MEMOIR: read the full text of the brain cancer memoir Cancer Patient free online. Initial problems, diagnosis, neurosurgery, chemotherapy, radiotherapy and the achievement of remission. Read free online or buy as a paperback book from Amazon.com.
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CANCER BLOG: following remission, brain cancer seems to have returned. Further investigations follow. The author investigates the mechanism of his death. The author's deteriorating vision turns out to be the consequence of radiation therapy, not the return of cancer. Blog entries deal with survivorhood issues including dealing with degraded vision and with brain damage caused by chemo and radiation. The online entries are part of the literary miscellany This Is A Picture Of Your God, available from Amazon.com.
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