Cancer Journals- Found Poem

On the morning of the third day,
the pain returned
home
bringing all of its kinfolk.  Not
that any
single
one of them was overwhelming, but just that all
in concert, or even in small repertory groups,

they were excruciating.

There were constant ones and intermittent ones.
There were short sharp and long dull and various combinations of the same ones.
The muscles in my back and right shoulder began to screech
as if they'd been pulled apart and
now
were coming back to life
slowly
and against their will.

My chest
wall
was beginning to ache and burn and stab
by turns.

My breast
which was no longer there
would hurt

as if were being squeezed in a vise.
That was perhaps the worst
pain
of all, because
it would come
with a full complement of horror
that I was to be forever reminded of
my loss
by suffering

in a part of me
which was no longer there. I suddenly seemed to get
weaker rather than stronger.  The euphoria
and numbing

effects
of the anesthesia
were beginning to subside

From page 37-38
Lorde, Audre. The Cancer Journals. Special Ed. San Francisco: aunt lute books, 1997.