Breath & Shadow
Summer 2024 - Vol. 21, Issue 1
On Diagnosis/Nine Years
written by
Imogen McHugh
Turns out I've got this
condition called HSD
(sounds like the name
of a construction firm)
So I am forced to consider
that this is not my fault
and in the black and white
red all-over newspaper
of my mind I review every
instance of self blame
and all of the ways that
I have punished my body
for its weakness and
dragged my poor carcass
to the brink -- to think
that I came from the mold
cracked already is not much
comfort.
Hypermobility
spectrum disorder doesn't
sound much like anything
so I start calling myself
Crustacean Girl hoping
that putting on a new shell
a new home new furniture
clicking my claws in the air
dancing sideways etcetera
will be healing but by now
I'm afraid I don't have much
faith in what the sea can do.
Good thing Crustacean Girl
doesn't need faith to survive.
Imogen McHugh is a young disabled poet from Norwich, England. She has an MA in poetry and one book of poems currently published: A King’s Bones, which came out in 2022. She loves crochet, poetry, dogs, and did she mention poetry? Find out more on her site!