New Old Hat

[oligoclonal]

I haven't written in a long, long time. I am used to criticism -- nay, I long for it. I have multiple sclerosis, and that prevents me from doing a lot of things I used to love. As giving up is not an option, I wrote the first poem I have in nearly a decade. I want to get back on my horse. Thank you for reading.

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I love words but I stopped reading
about two years ago when my eyes altogether
stopped finding joy in it. Late nights by a hallway’s glow after family went to bed
or in college or at any time in my life at any time of the day
are now memories included in The Life I Had which truth be told
is comprised mainly of troubled working parts I abandon with great relief.

I once had a favorite book but have no idea if it would now befit –
while it for so long encompassed the whole of me I no longer know
that it could anymore or which new story might. To simply listen
still robs the grit of lines embossed into a page; their shape and span and ink
made as much a story as the words they built. Whether or not, even,
there was a serif made the personality of each letter
as they appeared on a stage with curtains scalloped in the center .

I love painting but my vision burns the edges or middle off
details in the whole when I stand back to scrutinize its details. I cannot trust
my hands with the curves of a body or especially the fine grout in an eyelid.
I love walking but every proper or misstep fires from groin through thighs and
I love sleeping but do so now best in smaller increments during certain times and
I love swallowing and I love having an even pulse and I love
thinking outside the fog of frayed axons and I love
remembering and I love
I love I love
silver linings. I love knowing
why it is
I have become so very, very good at falling.