Saturday, October 13, 2012

Wandering Ovary

After many dark and stormy seasons,
The ovaries were comfortingly quiet for a time.
Perhaps they were scribbling their memoirs,
Content after dutiful years of service.
When the left one re-started oddly familiar aches,
Like jabs of stormy weather, doctors found nothing.
The shimmers of lightning did not originate in
The ovary place, the doctors said.

Not to worry, I gave up tomatoes as
Digesting them or the papery skins seemed to
Amplify a storminess tucked below the ribs.

"There's nothing there," the doctor assured me,
Speaking of the spot I pressed and pointed to.
Not for the first time, my thinking self
Seemed stuck in a mystery box body,
Everything I needed to see and
Understand was opaque
To me.

Then they called, requested an MRI as,
Studying the sonogram, the ovary on the left
Was missing. They said calmly.
"It's there!" says I.

"Couldn't you have a
sonogram equipment failure?"
The PA promised, no worries:
"We see this all the time."

Think of the ovary as a plump, cheeky walnut
Of a chappy who, after retirement from reproductive
Duties, shrinks to a wrinkled raisin-size thingy,
Very gradually. Some will wander, some will hide
Behind the uterus. Never forget we are
Never symmetrical:

Just as a left eye or hand is not a twin of the right,
A right ovary may be forward, flamboyant,
While the left is reticent, is less
Endowed with eggs from the start, or
Prefers stiletto heels to
Hiking boots ...

In 48 hours, test results are expected.
Here I sit, impatient for a postcard
Or telegram from a rogue ovary.