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Chemotherapy caused my brain to shrink. Radiation therapy then caused further degregation of the brain. The immediate results are short-term memory loss (which is probably permanent), difficulty in multi-tasking and the destruction of my ability to navigate at night. With the lights off, I get lost in my own bedroom.
Further down the track, I can expect that effects of aging which would normally cut in, say, thirty years later, will make themselves felt at an earlier age. This is the background of the poem, a combination of the reality of the present and the anticipated future. ICE CREAM BRAIN cancer poem in 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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Ice cream Is no violinist, Cannot play the triangle. Looking on the Taj Mahal you know That this was made to melt. And does so. Decay moded, My dissolution tumbrels, Not quite finding the word, Confusing Maisy with Miffy, Pol Pot with Madonna. In the slobber of syllables The tongue counts itself And finds no number. |
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May be photocopied for classroom use |
Click to Read |
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short poems |
school poems |
city poems |
nature poems |
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war poems |
cancer poems |
death poems |
other poems |
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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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