Excerpt
My oncologist's mind
has a hard time flowing
around the sharp-edged boulders
of statistical probability
down into the tranquil brook
of against all odds.

Too many times he's seen
the storm clouds
of diagnosis, of staging,
throw their gray and heavy drops
onto the garden of illness.
Battering hope's delicate butting
into soil too alkaline
with statistical outcome.

I want to ask him when
he decided to no longer be
the gardener, becoming instead
the weed-man,
tending to my garden, the gardens
of others, once the pink petals
are wilted,
the saplings choked?

It must be sad for him, this endless
quest to find the right pesticides,
poisons for the burgeoning,
unwelcome varieties of growth.
Especially in stage three gardens
like mine, and up to four.
After that, all seasons end;
there is no stage five.

I want to ease his pain
almost more than my own,
leading him out from behind
the fence of emotional protection
and tell him to remember.

Witnessing in seasons not long past,
weeds withering, some vanish
on their own, and gardens flourish
into ripe, full harvests
when even the most optimistic
gardener had forecated
drought.