Ellyn Peirson

Cancerwords Ellyn Peirson

Poetry is the only way to touch upon the experience of cancer. It is also the only way to find beauty in the beastliness. And for me, it was the only way to express my grief and allow healing into my life.

cancerwords is a record of Glenn Peirson's three year battle with a rare sinus cancer. Diagnosed at stage 4, Glenn did his elegant utmost to stay here for his wife and children, the joys of his life. As mother of this remarkable man for all seasons, I was seized by a need to write poetry and take photos on my prayer-walks. These media became my prayer forms. For me, they reached through the madness to a silence where pain is transformed into resilience. I was sustained, and enabled to be what Glenn, Mary, Theodora and Henry needed me to be.

It is my hope that this book will speak to others, particularly parents. I learned that I could survive what I had always said I couldn't, and learned that I will never cease to be wondrously proud of and inexplicably connected to my son, in whatever dimension he happens to be. And I learned that artistry is the soul of healing. There is a way for everyone. This is mine.

A profoundly moving journey through one man's battle with cancer, cancerwords is a sharply articulated and devastatingly raw story of grief and healing.