Let’s assume, little tumor, that our bodies misread
the imperative, made you contingent, parasitic, another
me within me for reasons only cells with their chromatin
ladders can fathom, tuft of hair, teeth, toenails, one

crescent-lidded eye gazing through veils of veins
for almost thirty years, a secret beneath my ribcage
desiring nothing more than a pocket in which to curl
like a nautilus, though hidden life can nucleate, burst

its borders, infect its host. From now on, every loss
will tether itself to this scar, formaldehyde’s stinging
release when I uncorked the specimen jar, fished

your baby-fist cadaver from the smoky liquid, let it curl
like a comma in my palm, all that can go wrong with a body
that still fights for that one fragile and fleeting attachment.