These poems are published as part of the Amplifying Disabled Voices special section, selected by editors Christopher Heuer, Marlena Chertock, and Gregory Luce.
 

Bag of Bones Stewing in Pearls of Wisdom

Hello my name is Bag of Bones
on a good day
or Wretched Sack of Bones
in brutal weather

We all have bad days.

Welcome to the woe is me space
a bleak land with no trees
where plague bulldozes bodies
and spews hell in its wake

Every cloud has a silver lining.

With the shrieeek of tinnitus on loop
cockier than life’s two firm truths
my crumbling spine would like a word
to name this hitbyMacktruck stew

Suffering builds character.

A mind disassembled
unmoored in its home
wandering the Bewilderness
in search of nouns and lost marbles

Not all who wander are lost.

Time is funny. Wibbly wobbly.
A crash course in aging
tumbling into eighty,
decades out of season

Age is just a number.

How far can I go in the woe
is me space? Blasting past sky
grasping for limits
clobbered and spent
all out of journey
requesting permission to land

It could be worse.
 

Tidings of Dementia

A monster in the shape of an envelope
arrived.

First, a polite greeting of Hello,
I come bearing news, please
won’t you take a peek inside?

Next, a steady tick tick ticking,
an unbending chant of here, I am
here, with hints of what’s to come.

Then, a murmur of Open. Open. Open.
Turned to a racket of thumping
and pounding, a full-throated
bark of here I am, hear me
howl.

Still drawn to the bliss of ignorance,
the space before knowing, suspended
before dawn, before hitting
the turn that knocks the course from north
to south, upright
to prone, calm
to storm.

What month is it? What year?
Who is the President?
Who was the President during the Civil War?
How are a hammer and a corkscrew similar?

They open, open, open, one
by blows of brute force, the other
with more grace and piercing pain.

To open or not to open?
That is the question. 

Camille Buckner is a psychology professor by day who found her way back to poetry through a life-altering illness. A prolific, unpublished poet in her youth, she left poetry behind for an academic career in social psychology, specializing in gender, prejudice, and discrimination. After becoming seriously ill with Long Covid in March of 2020, Camille began using creative writing as a means of processing the trauma of complex chronic illness. Her first essay, entitled “One Year of COVID-19 Long-Hauling: A Beginning with a Middle and No End,” was published by CARRE4 in 2021. While writing a second essay, “Living with Long Covid in a ‘Post-Pandemic’ World,” Camille rediscovered poetry as a powerful means of documenting and releasing her trauma. In sharing her poetry, she hopes to raise awareness about the devastation of Long Covid, challenge the gaslighting that often accompanies complex chronic illness, and help people in this community feel less alone.

Featured image in this post is, “Assorted Ice bergs Thule Greenland” by Drew Avery, licensed creative commons via Wikimedia Commons.

These poems are published as part of the Amplifying Disabled Voices special section, selected by editors Christopher Heuer, Marlena Chertock, and Gregory Luce.

pain

each a strife or shoulder
             a hurt somewhere
will it break us from
             our flicker of sorrow

maybe your hurt is
            your own, is winter
its splintering hungers
            summer’s flat pall
scent of boxwood
            in the beating heat

sometimes it’s all
             we’ve got
song and sweetly
             sickly hum hurt

we’ve all got what
             we think we own
until ache harangues
             us into absence
body gone out on
             the lonesome road
begging for mercy
            a polished stone

pain (2)

pot of nothing soil
            barren broke back

where even lizards
             hide their slither & chance

solitary seeker
             no sweet spring
             no oasis of possible

not even burble & reedy muck

terrible horizon
             I wander you in sun stasis
 

Sarah Browning is the author of Call Me Yes (FlowerSong Press, forthcoming), Killing Summer (Sibling Rivalry) and Whiskey in the Garden of Eden (The Word Works). Co-curator and co-host of Wild Indigo Poetry, she also teaches with Writers in Progress and coaches writers one-on-one. Co-founding director of Split This Rock, Browning received the Lillian E. Smith Award and fellowships from the DC Commission on the Arts & Humanities, VCCA, Yaddo, Porches, and Mesa Refuge. She lives in Philadelphia. More: www.sarahbrowning.net

Featured image in this post is, “Lizard on stone” By Andergr – licensed creative commons via Wikimedia Commons.

This poem is published as part of the Amplifying Disabled Voices special section, selected by editors Christopher Heuer, Marlena Chertock, and Gregory Luce.
 

counting

wake up check chart, one two three days before surgery, one two three pills plus one (and a gabapentin i found in the bottom of the drawer), one two three, up out of bed, shamble to the shower, scrub the site with antibiotics, back to bed again. deep breath in hurts too bad so i take little ones and count pills of oxycodone left. one two three four five six seven eight nine ten. two tramodol.

wake up check chart, one two days before surgery, one two pills, plus one, plus another, plus the hours between motrins, plus mom opens the shades for the sunlight hours. tried to call a friend today, couldn’t hack it. moaning and bitching from pain to a quiet receiver. is it too much? one two three up out of bed just barely crawling, and shower. wash the site. cant get MRSA again.

wake up check chart, one two three four days, one two three four five, one two three four five six seven days before surgery, or one, or two, or it’s the worst pain i’ve ever felt, and i tried to call a friend today but they were busy, or the sun is too bright and i’ve only got the tramadol, or i’ve got nothing in my stomach, can’t keep it down days left. drip dry instead of towels cos i can’t stand it anymore days left. lie on the floor on a blanket and cry many days left. miss laying on my stomach many days left. miss fresh air many days, miss sitting up many days. try to call a friend and it goes to voicemail days left. try to call a friend and they’ve got nothing to say days left. keep the door open just to hear voices days left. one two three tylenol, one two three four motrin, one oxycodone and a gabapentin for good measure.

wake up check chart, one day before surgery. one two hours until i have to stop eating. ask me what i want for dinner and i cry like a death row inmate at their final meal (oxy makes me weepy). try to call a friend today and they say, thank god it’s almost over, thank god, i agree, and wonder what they have to be thankful for.
 

yetzer hara

I found the face of God
at the bottom of a bottle of oxycodone.
It was an ugly sneering punim,
perfectly symmetrical,
hauntingly sleek.

He, Himself, and not an angel,
He, Himself, and not a seraph,
He, Himself, and not a messenger.

He asked if I had gotten His voicemail,
and I told Him I had,
and that I would call Him back
in the morning
if I felt a little bit better.

SB Young is a multiply disabled poet from the New York metro. He will be graduating from SUNY Stony Brook’s undergrad Creative Writing BFA, and helps run their undergrad magazine, Sandpiper Review. Other than that, you may have seen his work in various places across the internet, including ScribesMICRO or new words press. He likes enjambment, table-sized maps with knives in them, and videos of cats playing the piano.

Featured image in this post is, “Pills in blister pack” by Unknown, licensed creative commons via Wikimedia Commons.

These poems are published as part of the Amplifying Disabled Voices special section, selected by editors Christopher Heuer, Marlena Chertock, and Gregory Luce.
 

& Before I Arrived At After

I didn’t know,
you were their safety net;

I was
a non-entity,

Your something to be crafted
into a what

They could
handle;

And when you left
your body,

Mine loomed large
required duty;

Denial whispered in darkness
assumed I couldn’t hear

Don’t invite
her,

Shine in their
eyes;

Supposed I couldn’t
see

Who’s she gonna
ask,

In the thin-lipped
silence;

Of my
questions,

Left
hanging;

Now,
I know,

You protected
me.
_{-For my Daddy, John, father of a daughter living with quadriplegia and cerebral palsy}

Until Now, I’ve Never Written A Poem That Had To Be Redacted

What happened?

I ordered shower chair wheels
from a service rep named Marta,

On backorder,
my wheels were canceled,
called back and reordered;

Front to left,
right to back,

That’s what the invoice
should have said;

Instead, my inbox opened to a (redacted here)
county Summons, in a West Coast (redacted here)
state court by (redacted here) officials for (redacted here) offences;

Failure to appear
would result in an arrest;

To take place at a
(redacted here) location…

When I rang the only number in sight,
Marta answered and my recorded findings
unwittingly caused Marta to audibly redact her own chewing gum;

Only then did recognition
pierce my unheard thoughts;

Marta’s unauthorized at-work interweb interests
attached themselves to my in-route wheels;

And her job spun on the line
between hushed recoil and what could not be rescinded.

Kristie L. Williams is a quadriplegic living with cerebral palsy. Her debut chapbook, Finding Her, was published in 2022 by Finishing Line Press. Her poetry is also published in Cairn, Main Street Rag, Dan River Review, Hermit Feathers Review, Heron Clan, Madness Muse Press, Snapdragon, Big City Lit, Nostos, Does It Have Pockets, Maximum Tilt Solstice Anthology, Fixed and Free Quarterly, Artemis, Chiron Review and The Poetry Society of Virginia Centennial Anniversary Anthology of Poems. She is a 2022 Pushcart nominee and a 2022 and 2025 Best of the Net nominee. Williams received an MA Ed. in Adult Education and taught for 12 years in the North Carolina Community College System. She uses her own story of quadriplegia and cerebral palsy to advocate for herself and others with disabilities. Williams considers her work as ‘disability adjacent’, because although it shapes the context of her work cerebral palsy does not overshadow the arc of her story. When she’s not playing with words, Williams is participating in adaptive recreation, creating mixed media art, reading great books, and going to rock concerts. Her website is: kristielwilliams.com

Featured image in this post is, “Redacted page 53 of Mueller report”, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.