I keep imagining an earthquake
As I sit here at MD Anderson
This cubbyhole treatment room
Would collapse and crumble
Crushing us instantly
As I imagine these things I feel nothing
And somehow that seems right

I think, “that’s ridiculous,
There are no earthquakes in Houston"
And try instead to picture a hurricane
Drowning us in this cramped space
But the image feels fake, forced

The earthquake is real
The earthquake is happening
Not the tremors of foreshadowing
(I have those sea-legs)
But the violent shaking
The breaking apart
The crushing finality
The only end that will tell the truth
Changing the landscape forever.