Mary von Seggern, Sister
Likely Love, June 24, 2025
I’d like to write something that’s happy
I’d like to write something that’s pert
I’d like to write something that just picks me up
And chases off all of this dirt
I’d love to be free from my cancer
I’d love to be healthy and hale
I’d love the disease to just kiss my ass
In response to the love I inhale
I’d really like her to defeat it
I’d really like her to grin big
I’d really like her to sing with me while
We dance a hilarious jig
I’d really love it if we happened
To find out that we’d both been healed
I’d really love it if we opened our wit
And turned poetry into what’s real
I often find tears I’ve been crying
Have pooled up on top of my desk
I often find tears in her sweet eyes as well
We’ve wept our way into a mess
But don’t you know crying is happy?
But don’t you know sadness can heal?
I’ve often begun to think good life is done
But wait, I’m still able to feel!
I feel my life force start to dwindle
The tips of my fingers turn numb
But my soul it is stronger than ever
It isn’t yet time to succumb
My sweet love sits loathing her chemo
Her tears, far from dry, still run free
I hold her tired head to my shoulder
And emanate wellness from me
I think I wrote something that’s happy
I think I wrote something alive
We are both still living; to each other giving
The kindness we need to survive
I’ll look forward, Mary’s poem in response
I’ll look forward to seeing you on the other end,
But this time hasn’t ended, and time doesn’t bend.
So we will live out this life we are given,
And from it we will not quickly be driven!
Still, ‘tis consolation to look and to see
The time that we will all happily
Be gathered sans hindrance or illness or sorrow,
And joy, hope and future we won’t need to borrow.
So today, ‘tis my hope, my trust and my prayer,
That from this place here, until we are there,
We go forward sure our “together” will find us,
And always, and always, our deep love will bind us.