when everything good leaves my body
my loves, my likes, my have done/s, my will do/s
when my arms are limp, my mind full of a buzzing and humming
when my friends are whisked away into the whirlwind of their lives
and I am the only inactive thing
I am left with your voice chipping away at my mind
it’s as if I had been wearing all my accomplishments like a robe
holding them close to my body
covering the inadequacy underneath
when my body grinds to a halt
and I am stripped of every ounce of my value
underneath it all, you are still here
red and raw on my naked skin
when the pain of my throbbing joints flood me
my whole self circling around and around
I try to imagine that the grey aches and sharp flashes
are something beautiful
tonight I ask myself
what does my pain look like?
I shut my eyes and see the night sky filled with stars
I am the black expanse of unending nothingness
my pain appears as a million balls of light
the shape of me is only visible
by following the path of my pain
© 2020, Kella Hanna-Wayne
KELLA HANNA-WAYNE (Yopp), one of our newest Zine team members and a partner in our upcoming February series on illness and disability, is a disabled, chronically/mentally ill freelance writer who is the editor, publisher, and main writer for Yopp, a social justice blog dedicated to civil rights education, elevating voices of marginalized people, and reducing oppression; and for GlutenFreeNom.Com, a resource for learning the basics of gluten-free cooking and baking. Her work has been published in Ms. Magazine blog, Multiamory, Architrave Press and is forthcoming in a chapter of the book Twice Exceptional (2e) Beyond Learning Disabilities: Gifted Persons with Physical Disabilities. For fun, Kella organizes and DJ’s an argentine tango dancing event, bakes gluten-free masterpieces, sings loudly along with pop music, and makes cat noises. You can find her on Facebook, Twitter, Patreon, Medium, and Instagram.
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