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Radiance
for Brian
You will take care of me after radiation. I will appear to be
perfectly fine and still make you cackle with my humor and wit.
We will go see a Broadway show the next evening for the
holidays and then we will enjoy a heavy dinner which will make
me wish my appetite had been suppressed. I’ll make catty
comments about the clientele. I will make you forget the
bandages just came off that morning. My new fancy hat will
conceal the wounds. I’ll let you complain about your friends and
browse through Facebook to see who got married and who just
had another baby. And the next day we’ll celebrate
Christmas and gift each other with the latest Apple technology.
We’ll go to my mom’s to be with my family before the two-hour
drive to your sister’s in Connecticut. The memories of nails
driven into my skull will dissipate in
fear of a deer jumping out at us on the road. Speed limits will
help gauge recovery time. When we arrive, Duke the dog will
substitute for Alexis the cat and the love that healed breakups
and violent attacks and surgery. There will be no time to think
about headaches or nausea or tiredness. In fact, there will be
no symptoms out of the ordinary other than an early
night. You will perhaps be more exhausted emotionally than
I am physically. We’ll come back to my apartment in time to put
together a last-minute New Year’s Eve party much like I
had originally hoped to have before the diagnosis. There will
be family and close friends and lots of Fireball shots, of
course. I will laugh at your imitations of the local hipsters and
kiss you when the ball drops in Times Square. By then, my
bruises will look like nothing more than chickenpox. We will
have better sex than most healthy, younger couples.
It’ll be like nothing ever happened except for the selfie I took
while drugged up wearing a metal piece on my head. The
two of us simply happy that we found each other after all these
years.
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Emanuel Xavier is the author of several poetry books including Pier Queen, Americano, If Jesus Were Gay, Nefarious, and Radiance. His latest collection is Love(ly) Child (Rebel Satori Press, 2023). He is recipient of a New York City Council Citation Award, an International Latino Book Award, and a Gay City Impact Award. His work has appeared in Poetry, A Gathering of the Tribes, and elsewhere. [Photo of Emanuel Xavier by Brian Berger, 2023.]
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Bigots are angry because ABC & CNN aired a gay kiss on New Year’s Eve
Go to Source
Author: Terence Winch
