Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, MY KNEECAPS ARE SWEATING AT 4 AM, by JUDITH STRASSER


Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

MY KNEECAPS ARE SWEATING AT 4 AM, by                    
First Line: And I read this as good, a sign
Subject(s): Mothers & Sons; Sickness; Illness


and I read this as good, a sign
the disease has decided to leave
although I discover the damp spots
on the underside of the comforter
when I wake with a wracking cough
that I worry will worry my son
the way I worried when every cough
in his first three years moved
into his lungs until his doctor asked
did I taste salt when I kissed him
and ran tests for cystic fibrosis.
Waiting, I stared at the pamphlet,
words about lungs, short lives,
how to pound chest and back
to loosen infected pflegm. His death
seemed more likely than my own
despite my night sweats, swollen nodes,
dry cough, the metallic chemo taste
that invaded my nose and tongue.

It was one big false alarm. I lived
to see him through high school.
He outgrew the recurrent pneumonias,
though the fevers marked his teeth,
spots the enamel doesn't shield.
I worry now he'll fall asleep
driving to college, be mugged
on the subway near his dorm, collide
with a tree on the night-lit slopes at Vail.
I worry he'll never find love.
When morning comes, my eyes are clear
for the first time in a week, I can stand
and my head doesn't throb, the gland
in my neck is tender, but smaller,

the virus seems to be going, maybe
it's almost gone. I strip off the comforter
cover and haul it down to the wash.
Over juice, he asks how I'm feeling,
and I say, fine, and it's a day
I don't worry that he will worry
about being a motherless child.


Copyright © Judith Strasser.
http://www.unl.edu/schooner/psmain.htm
Prairie Schooner is a literary quarterly published since 1927 which
publishes original stories, poetry, essays, and reviews. Regularly cited in the
prize journals, the magazine is considered one of the most prestigious of the
campus-based literary journals.







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