V.
I cast horoscopes on your lit constellations
of carcinogens. The red dwarf
end of your cigarette flared at the temperature of fission,
supernova before flickering into darkness.
VI.
The harmonic convergence of disaster.
You wouldn’t show the new map of your system,
but I imagined the cluster of burning cells,
aberrant nebulae spanning the horizon of your lungs.
III.
It felt like the moment of takeoff, when the pressure
collapsed you against your seat and sent you spinning
into nausea. Your eyes, fixed only on the full moon
face of the toilet bowl.
II.
You, dark star, the gravity of your swelling belly
catching the chemo crew in your orbit.
I.
Hospice workers like fortune tellers reading off EKGs
as star charts: two weeks, five days, twenty-four hours.
…
Amidst the vacuum of your room, the echo of your wheezing
pull on the oxygen tank: astronaut torn from the mothership
drifting into the vast dark of space.
(For CRW 3310, Fall)
