MEDICAL MIRACLE Poem by Vrouwkje Tuinman

I don't know exactly what my father
died of in the end, but he had every
disease going. Diabetes, cancer, shingles, colic.
His head was slowly eaten up from the inside.
On the outside you saw nothing but his birthmarks,
but something clogged up in his chest.
According to Freud, all those defects
have a meaning. All the more since
he complained little. Never about his illnesses.
Only about it all being the fault of others.
And there you have it: heart and prostate,
the places where the body crops up,
things best left in the dark.
Diabetes to sweeten his bitter
breath, shingles as an excuse to stop
touching him. Until eventually his skull was
empty, and my father defeated by the world.