black friday

Our sister didn't die on Black Friday,
but our mother did.
Our sister died in spring,

but she knew she was dying at Thanksgiving.
She wished she'd got a sexier cancer —
breast, brain or even leukemia.

Sexy meant funded by research.
Instead she got inoperable stomach cancer.
We got periwinkle blue cancer ribbons.

Periwinkle blue sounded awfully airy-fairy.
She thought that was hilarious. Her last Thanksgiving
she thought lots of things were hilarious.

She was still able to drink wine then.
Chemo! Chemo was comical. It's absolute poison, she said,
twirling the beaded charm on her wine glass.

She'd call us during sessions just to punctuate
the tedium, her heavy voice muddled by monotony
and cell damage. Our sister sighed like no tomorrow.

Insurance was laughable. How she had to appeal and appeal
when a treatment stopped working just to be able to try
a new inhibitor or anti-tumor cocktail.

Bankruptcy was hysterical. To hell with it, she’d said,
buying her children new beds, so at least
they'd have somewhere to sleep.

Most diverting of all were her eyebrows,
the bald ridges where they used to be. She drew them on
and rubbed them off, side-lipping her absurd observations.

How tired she was! How listless! How her damn wig itched!
She held it like a bowl, begging us in high comedy. My brother and I
didn't need charms to tell us whose glass was empty

or full as we drank pour after pour with her side-splitting,
our sister killing us with black humor, laughing and howling,
and clutching our guts.

© Tori Grant Welhouse