Facing the Tumor

Facing the Tumor

By DJ Gaskin

When they dangled the lump, safely suspended,

floating in translucent liquid, snugly contained

inside a plastic cylinder no bigger around

than the quarter I pay every day for bad news;

when they--the nurse at my request

and my kindly surgeon's reluctant consent--

when they held it just an unmoving

arm's length from my face but high, forcing

my hopeful eyes upward as if in prayer pleading;

when they let me in on the medical wonder

of witnessing that clump of tissue--white, rounded

lumpy mass, cloudlike but so hard, a heavy knot

deep in my chest just a moment past,

now ready to dissect and ponder;

when they dangled this private tiny solitary nugget

of mystical tissue before me--my eyes could not

open wide enough to see the whole of it--

and I pointed out to all of them--

and this, surpassing

the delirium--

that it was shaped just like

a heart: heart-shaped and,

I reasoned,

as harmless.