Poet and Edinburgh Branch member Vicki Feaver was commissioned by the Forward Arts Foundation to write a poem on the theme of Choice for this year’s National Poetry Day. This is the poem she wrote, in which she starts out seeing her Parkinson’s as an enemy and ends up seeing it as a friend.
Ode to Parkinson’s
You began as my enemy:
slowing my steps,
shaking my left arm
and leg, scaring me
with what you’d do next.
I once banished a burglar
by rushing downstairs
shrieking like a Maenad.
But we were locked together
in a wobbly dance.
The more frantic I got
the more I juddered,
like a wind-up doll
or jiggling puppet.
We got on best
when I took the lead:
moving my body
with sudden speed,
exaggerated slowness,
or intentional force.
The same with my mind:
free to roam, it raced
towards catastrophe.
I had to change it
to see you as a friend.
You were in me for years
but waited to show
until my mind and body
were in danger of settling
into old-age stupor.
You jolted me awake:
challenging me to live
every minute left to me,
to burst into flower
like a desert cactus.