Cycle of Little Animals​

Issue 16

“a crustacean evolves into a crab-like form
from a non-crab-like form”
(“Carcinisation,” Wikipedia)
 
The Greeks named cancer carcinogenesis,
because the swollen veins around a tumor
resembled the eight limbs of a crab.
 
After Heracles slew the one that bit him,
Hera placed the crab among the stars
in a cluster “invisible to the naked eye.”
 
Some are born, and some become crabs.
The non-crab yearns to acquire exoskeleton
and claws, to become a real crab.
 
Hidden like the nebulous star cluster,
cancer dreams of being a person. It grows
arms and legs, bursts the shell of its host,
until at last the real human is visible
only with the naked eye.

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Charisse Gendron is a poet living in Portland, Maine. Her work has appeared in The RavensPerch, Clepsydra, Blood & Bourbon, and other publications.

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