Body of a Sick Poet

A poem

Body of a Sick Poet

At first glance, I look like every other person.
These curves aren’t metaphors 
for a highway to health 
or rolling fields of flowers.
This brittle hair isn’t a personification
of a lion’s mane—
Fierce with anger at being examined 
by a zoo onlooker.
The scars on my knees 
aren’t maps to send you on
to the next big adventure that will 
change your life.
They are signs of a normal
childhood filled with hard play.
But these weak legs are broken. 
They are wobbly
as a newborn calf struggling to stand 
against a strong breeze. 
This cane isn’t an extension
of my arms or a third leg to hold me 
up after a marathon.
It’s just a cane used by a thirty-year-old.
My heart beating hard against my breast
is like a clock, but it’s not a simile. 
All of our hearts
do such. Mine just beats faster, beats harder.
These breasts don’t point up, perky because the weight
of too many hospital gowns and sticky pads
have changed them. 
Now they are just breasts. 
Nothing special. Just like these pale lips. 
They aren’t pale like death, 
but they aren’t red, parted, anticipating 
a wine drunk lover. They’re just pale.
I’m just sick, 
not a metonym for a supposed dying art.