Dyselxic I am not by Barry Fentiman Hall

Dyselxic I am not
But I paddle the same cnut
Through the same waters
As some of you
Some shit went down
When I popped out
I bounced ma said
I took a clout
Or something like that
Something to do
With my unformed head
She would always
Change the subject
So up I grow
Undiagnosed
Undisclosed
I walked on tiptoe
As though that’s the way
That everybody goes
I was a playground sensation
I was copied by
All the other kids
If we’d had Facebook
It would o’ been the nation
Some kind of tribute
Obviously
At least that’s what
I thought till
The first boot
Sought to fill
My skinny arse
Followed by the cry
Of
“We’ve seen ya ballerina”
So much for being a
Pied piper of fashion
I was a rat
A brat
A spacca
An anagram
And a rum un
I could not stay within
The lines
Still can’t sometimes
A writer who cannot
Write
What’s this?
A piece of genuine irony
Alanis
Don’t you think?
But through ten years
Of pointless
Physiotherapy
An aborted operation
And an affected strut
I managed to cover up
The things that cut
Till the convulsions
Of my growth spurt
Pulled my head
This way and that
Till my neck hurt
More than after
I saw Anthrax at
Bradford that time
In mosh pits
No-one can see you spaz
And they don’t give a shit
Mishapes mistakes
Backwards heroes
Efulnikufesin
Is what it makes
And it was too
In the sweat and the beer
I was tolerated
Among the stoners
Nothing to fear
From the damage cases
I was unaware that
I was literally a human jerk
Until I heard a guy at work
Remark how sad it was
Ma was still saying nothing
So on I spazzed
Undiagnosed
Undisclosed
Not yet bazzed
Somehow dating
And self medicating
I had through years
Of unemployability
And assessments
Gone through the gears
Learned to read
Upside down
And so a health scare
Got me freed
Made me aware
In Dr Walker’s surgery
Of my ataxia
Those things
That attacks ya
When you’re
Trying to be cool
I had always been
Cerebral
Now I was
Palsied too
A defining moment
I was diagnosed
And the doc and my ma
Ummed and aaahd
And for a while
You might say that I was scarred
But it is good to know
You know?
And after a while
I begun to embrace the D
The D?
You know
You and me
The diagnosed
We may disclose
Or not
As we please
We are
Dyslexic
Dyspraxic
Dysgraphic
Acrobatic
Disabled?
Naah
But an injury to one is an injury to all
If you fall I fall
We are
Delicious
Desirable
Conspicuous
Bibulous
Joyously ridiculous
Indescribable
Undecipherable
I am diagnosed
I have disclosed
And if the world
Cannot deal
With how I identify
My D fined rickety bits
Then you can kiss my ass
Not kick it

..

Barry is a Kent based writer of site specific poetry often inspired by his far wanderings. He has been published in City Without A Head (Wordsmithery 2013), An Assemblance Of Judicious Heretics (Wordsmithery 2015), and The Unbearable Sheerness Of Being (Wordsmithery 2016). He runs a monthly poetry night in Chatham called Roundabout Nights and reads his work regularly across the South East and anywhere else that will have him.

https://theestuarymonologues.wordpress.com/2016/06/