What A Life Can Fit
During her ninth line of chemotherapy
and fourth time losing her hair, she goes
to the hospital for her last scan results.
It’s been three months since the cancer
spread to her lungs. Long ago,
she lost the “fear of missing out”
on things people her age usually do.
She spends the good days planting roses
in the local community garden.
Stable disease, the scan report reads
and she tells her doctor of when she pulls weeds
and gathers leaves feeling like a healthy person.
She plays familiar beats on chunky headphones,
sitting between sycamores and their apparent
unawareness of pain, subject of her fascination.
She wonders if this is what she would miss.
How many good days can be fit into a life?
BIO: Monica Pernia Marin is a beginner poet and a board-certified physician in internal medicine, geriatrics, and palliative care. She is the winner of the Medmic Summer Poetry Contest 2024. She is currently a neuro-oncology fellow in NYC.