He Feels his Tumor Grow

That’s what he calls it, that thing inside him
he doesn’t know what.
Surely, the naming will tame it:
tumor, tumor. Then, it will
stop growing,
this feeling.
In him, on him, by him, with him . . .
he uses prepositions to make him think he knows.
He doesn’t.
When did it start? It was always there,
never there.

He says his but doesn’t know why.
He doesn’t possess it,
even know it,
but there it is,
his;
he feels it
somewhere
growing:

all that unknowing.

Jean Toyama