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31 Days of Pink Ribbon Poetry
Collected by Alysa Cummings
Digital images by Alysa Cummings
Affiliation: The Abramson Cancer Center of the University of Pennsylvania
Last Modified: May 1, 2008
How to Stay Alive
Judith Strasser
From: The Cancer Poetry Project Karin B. Miller, Editor, Copyright © 2001 Fairview Press
Trash your cigarettes. Shun restaurants and bars
that traffic in secondhand smoke. Eat organic
and low on the food chain. Steam vegetables;
don't grill meat. Just say "no" to marijuana, Jack
Daniels and cocaine. Stay home: do not rent cars
at Miami's airport, or ride the New York subways,
or dig potshards in the Negev after massacres
in Hebron. Don't drive vans older than you are
to places you've never been. Always buckle your
seat belt. Have someone else strip the asbestos
from your furnace and heating pipes. Test for radon
in the basement, lead in the drinking water, cracks
in the microwave shield. Avoid electric blankets.
Use condoms, or don't have sex. Walk to work.
Remember your sunblock. Don't go jogging after dark.
Keep off the neighbors' grass after they've sprayed
the yard. Wear a helmet when you bike. Take
a buddy to the lake. Don't lie about your weight
to the man who adjusts your skis. Lower stress
with yoga; divorce your husband if you must. Cross
your fingers, say "Star Bright" to Venus, avoid
black cats, spit three times over your shoulder
on your thirteenth annual visit to the oncologist.
Quotable Healing - Quote of the Day
If I had my way I'd make health catching instead of
disease.
— Robert Ingersoll
About 31 Days of Pink Ribbon Poetry
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Coping with Cancer