Category: poetry

Pain Manifesto

Isy / / critical thinking, CRPS knock-on effects, loved ones, opinion, perspective, philosophy, poetry, tasty words

This came out of cold chronic CRPS type 1, a debilitating condition of intractable chronic pain, nervous system disruption, and multi-system dysregulation — destroying the body’s ability to manage heat/cold, blood sugar, immune defense, circulation, sensation, bone density, movement, vision, digestion, heart function, and ultimately survival.

“Standard” treatments don’t work well for me; moreover, they involve invasive procedures too brutal to tolerate and medications I’m either outright allergic to, or that impair me so profoundly I can no longer function. At all.

So I took myself off my meds, thought things over, and came to the following conclusions.

MY CHRONIC PAIN MANIFESTO

Yes, it hurts.
It’s going to anyway.

So should I hoard my days
And fast from life?
Comfort myself with poisons,
Blister-packed and FDA approved?

Some think it would be best all ’round.
I’d cure them if I could (heh!)
But I’m too tired for
Yet another pointless struggle.

The sunlight pours through trees like prosecco
And reminds me what it means to live:

Voices warm with love, the
Mouth-smack of good food,
The hug of hills and the
Rough snuggles of the sea.

Hoard my days? I’ll spend each one
Like it’s stuffed with jewels
Pouring through my hands like a miser’s dream.

Feast on this:
The cost of life is much the same.
The difference lies in how you spend it.

Words, words, and words, with a poetry chaser

Isy / / humor, perspective, poetry, satire, tasty words

I have logical and philosophical objections to certain words used to describe me or what I do. I don’t expect anyone to change the way they speak, but feel free to entertain yourself by mulling two ideas and reading one egregious rhyme (think Lewis Carroll meets either Timothy Leary or Tom Lehrer, I’m not sure which.)

Word 1: Disabled

Hah! I am extremely able, thank yeeew. With both hands behind my back and my head held under water, I am still able. I’m able to add 2 and 2, for instance, or quote that wonderful bit from Twelfth Night that starts, “I’d build me a willow cabin at your gate, and wait upon my soul within the house …” Mind you, if you’re holding me underwater, it would be hard to check that, but I can still do it, I assure you.

I am handicapped. Like a runty little horse that has to have 30 pounds of lead stuffed into its saddle before it gets into the race. Like a golfer who’s being scored by a drunk with a broken calculator. I have exactly the same tasks to accomplish as anyone else in the race or on the course, but I have some added burdens that make it rather harder to succeed.

Word 2: Recovery

Why should I want to re-cover? Of all the covers that have been ripped off, I can’t say I think all that many need to go back on. I love all this fresh air. I love the lack of artifice. I love the inward freedom of having so much stuffing removed.

I don’t need recovering. Appropriate padding, yes; portable cushions, yes please, by all means. But upholstery is just one big refuge for dust mites and dander, metaphorical and otherwise.

I aim to heal. Healing from any profound physical or mental insult (and CRPS is certainly both!) does not mean going back to what or who or how I was before, it means finding a new way forward. There is no way back, and if there were, I have no reason (given how things played out) to think that returning there would be good for my health!

No, it’s forward for me: man the lifeboats, or woman them of course, but I’ll head for new horizons rather than try to wade back through the hideous swamp I sometimes think I’m climbing out of.

The Rhyme: “Re-cover and Heel — an overstretched metaphor”

Before you read further, let it be clearly understood that I love dogs, I have always loved dogs, and I’m old enough to use the word “bitch” in its traditional sense of female dog. In this case, an upholstered one…

The brocade bitch took a turn for the worse
and bit off the toe of a shoe.
The shoe kicked back with a bitter laugh
And said, “That the worst you can do?”

Upholstery torn, the bitch barked out,
“You’re badly in need of a nurse!”
The shoe stomped off and hollered back,
“You’ll soon be in need of a hearse!”

So the bitch went home to patch things up
While the shoe sought places new.
She’s jacquard now, otherwise fine;
He’s Prada, Gucci, and Diesel too.

Nacre

Isy / / nature, poetry, tasty words

“Nacre” sounds like an erotic euphemism. A leisurely beachcombing near ancient oyster beds led me to realize that. In fact, it went further, and prompted a poem.

The meter, for those who care, is represented visually as follows:


_._._._
._._.

Oh the shine! My fingers ache
To touch that sweet thing:

Silken colors, slippery,
As soft as me there;

Curves that arc in gentle swoons
Around the body

Once awash in holy calm
Within that temple,

Wrapping scarves of pearl
Around its softness:

Breathing water, eating sand,
Sweating heaven.

Casing empty, body gone,
It fills my eyes now:

Oyster shell, long empty, laps
The flowing water.