60 for 60: The Hernia

By Jackie Charniga

In “The Hernia,” published in Columbia Journal’s thirty-second issue, American poet Ross Gay ruminates about the warmth of spring as he awaits surgery for an abdominal hernia.

Gay compares his hernia—a condition that occurs when internal organs penetrate through muscle or tissue in the abdomen—to flower buds pushing through branches and to streets “oozing” with open-toed shoes as spring burns away the vestiges of winter. He thus transforms an injury into a gorgeous meditation on rebirth.

Gay, an accomplished poet and professor from Youngstown, Ohio, has written several books, an essay collection, and a chapbook. Gay has a bachelor’s degree from Lafayette College, an MFA in poetry from Sarah Lawrence College, and a PhD in American Literature from Temple  University.

The Hernia

Ross Gay


The gingko bones shiver a bit, dream
of full bloom, of a million fan-shaped leaves
and a million juicy stink bombs—this year
I'll watch those buds push out of the trees'
knuckles, I'll watch the coat of green slowly
fill the wiry limbs; each night I'll see
less wood, more elegant foliage—it won't
sneak up on me like last year, one day
so cold the car coughs and spits, the next
so warm Kennedy Blvd. oozes with open-toed
shoes, with, God bless them, those Jersey
City dresses, cotton butterflies riding
and hiding the saunter's supple, muscled, crux;
I'll feel the warmth slither out of winter's linger
like a python pulling out of a withered cloak of scales,
I'll finger the pink, sutured worm crawling into my
navel, walk to the courts, careful not to
sneeze, I'll watch the first golden river
of ballers hollering back and forth, hear
that perfect sound, the rock's pound and bounce,
and I'll fall in love 14 times in one evening,
once with a head fake, once a crossover, maybe
a good head of cornrows, or a woman's quick
walk outside the fence, trying to be invisible
to the twenty sweaty black men on the sideline.
I'll be waiting, you see, for this repaired
leak in my belly's lining to heal.
Doctor says four weeks from surgery: May 1st.
That's four weeks beginning of spring, four
weeks when the jaunt to the court is a sugar-
soaked breast stroke to a Darwinian blacktop
mamba where swap dog kin swim like a five-
finned fish, like a fist wet with the sweat of sex—
let's face it; I love you,
and for one month, starting tomorrow,
my heart, for you, will thrash itself like a horsefly
caught in a thimble, and I'll be that kid, you know
him, sad eyes and palms aglisten, fogging
the aquarium glass, begging the ray's smooth wings
to cast a gray, fluid shadow across his back,
the water's gentle pull and push the truest soothe
he could imagine, except I'm dreaming of a drop
step, a fast break, a no-look pass, and God, I hope
you wait for me (as I will wait for you); and as the syrupy
drugs roll through my veins, and the one hour
undertow takes hold, I'll be thinking
of you, angel, the only one who loves me
exactly as I want: silently and
in my dreams.