Love Letter to the Lesion in My Brain

Erin Zarro

TW: explicit language, illness, mentions of death

Here’s a secret. This thing in my brain – this mass of cells and tissue — it’s not my friend – is it going to grow? Is it going to kill me?

Because I’ll tell you now: The Grim Reaper will have to drag me, screaming the whole way, from my life.

Because it is mine and I’m not fucking ready.

Not. Fucking. Ready.

I haven’t turned fifty yet, damn it. That’s too young to…yeah.

Too fucking young.

I never believed a small clump of cells in my white matter would take me out.

I always said I’d go out in a blaze of fire. And at the age of ninety, right?

But this little clump of cells might suck the life out of me, keep me from collecting those beautiful moments of joy, the things that make life worth the infinite breaths every single day.

The highs. The lows. The human experience.

All of it, human shaped and filled with blood and held together with bone.

But that blood… That’s a reminder that I’m here, I’m still breathing, something’s moving through my veins and arteries and I am not.

I’m not.

Grim Reaper’s gotta wait. I can see him, scythe upraised, ready to yank my soul out.

I’m not ready. I’m too young. I’m healthy. I refuse to go. I will scream for an eternity before I allow him to put one skeletal finger on me.

Oh, did my rage reach you, sir, at the wrong time?

I think you got the wrong chick. Check your records and fucking call back.

Or, better yet, don’t. Cause I ain’t answerin.’

This phone line is no longer in service.

I’ll tell you another secret: I have a lesion in my brain.

It might be cancer.

But fucking hell, I’m not letting it take me.

I’m too young to go.

Too young to go.

Too young to go.

More from Erin Zarro ↓

• @erinzpoetry on Instagram
• Her two chapbooks, Life as a Moving Target, and Without Wings, are available now.