Poetry Out Loud

"It's simple ... go the extra mile and you will stand out from the crowd." - Robin Crow

Survivor’s Guilt
By Patricia Kirkpatrick

How I’ve changed may not be apparent.
I limp. Read and write, make tea at the stove
as I practiced in rehab. Sometimes, like fire,
a task overwhelms me. I cry for days, shriek
when the phone rings. Like a page pulled from flame,
I’m singed but intact: I don’t burn down the house.

Later, cleared to drive, I did outpatient rehab. Others
lost legs or clutched withered minds in their hands.
A man who can’t speak recognized me
and held up his finger. I knew he meant
One year since your surgery. Sixteen since his.
Guadalupe wishes daily to be the one before. Nobody
is that. Sometimes, like love, the neurons just cross fire.
You don’t get everything back.

آلرآئِعونْ حَقاً .. هُمْ مَنْ يَشعُرون دآئِماً بِـقِيمَة مَآ تُقدمُه مَهمَآ كَانْ بَسيطاً - شكسبير

Create from the heart, not from the head.

مثل أشعة الفجر .. ومثل الماء في النهر .. ومثل الغيم والأمطار .. والأعشاب والزهر ..أليس الحب للإنسان .. عمراً داخل العمر!