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In place of her amputated breasts she had
a picture tattooed.
An angel flew down on its upside-down
sky. Outside it snowed.
The stone was rolled away, the angel
sat at the entrance to the cave.
She sank into squinting nighttime
light: how lucky she never gave birth.
Six months after the first surgery her stomach
was cut open. They removed whatever
the chemo left on the aorta and veins,
all the lymphomas and nodes.
She was cold in the operating theatre.
A needle injected her with sleep.
The last thing she saw was a hand; she fell
into a tight cocoon filled with viscous