#SeasonalSonnets: 5th Dec.

Hello my lovely readers and welcome to the fifth instalment of my #SeasonalSonnets series - another late one following a busy day. I was meant to have an appointment to be fitted for a new lycra suit, this time just for my top half. It's basically a neoprene-ish corset top that'll help with my core stability. I was pretty excited, but then I couldn't get into the clinic building, because there were very steep stairs and their ramp was too small for my chair. So here's my response to that, which started off rather angrily but turned into something pleasingly positive. I've also made an approximation of my back as I want it to be, through the medium of 'light drawing', which I'll use to visualise.

Hope you enjoy.

5^th December

Today my sonnet’s subject is my spine

(or rather an appointment all about it)

which, in the end, was just a waste of time –

I couldn’t get up the clinic stairs t’attend it.

You’d think a practice based on scoliosis,

where movement aids like wheelchairs abound,

would understand important things like access

but ‘common sense’ is not so easily found.

I thought perhaps this year I’d get a present

that has some semblance to a straighter back.

Tonight I have no more than to resent

that I must wait ‘til January – alack!

And yet, methinks, this might just be my chance

t’explore what I can do to fix my stance. 

Copyright Jessi Parrott December 2016

#SeasonalSonnets: 4th Dec.

Hello my dear readers and thank you for sticking with me for this fourth instalment in my #SeasonalSonnets venture. Today's post is rather late, mostly because I've just arrived home after a long motorway drive and an even longer (but lovely) day. You can read about that in the poem, though, so without further ado here it is - along with another suitably atmospheric 'light drawing'. I was going for a fire and brimstone aesthetic with this one, hopefully you'll realise why!

Much love until tomorrow...

4^th December

Since th’earliest poems were also known as ‘songs’,

being held in mem’ry and not written,

today, it seems to me, I can’t be wrong

to pen this sonnet about musical rhythms.

For clarity, that rhyme refers to singing,

which is how I have busied myself today –

so now this verse thanks Verdi’s Req for bringing

the Symphony Orch and Chorus out to play.

Although we’re cold and tired t’end the term

we somehow found the energy to blast

the ‘Dies Irae’ and ‘Requiem Aeternam’

as befits such genius from the past.

So, hopefully, we did his music proud –

if not, at least the trumpets rang out loud!

Copyright Jessi Parrott December 2016

  

#SeasonalSonnets: 3rd Dec.

Hello lovely readers!

This third instalment of my #SeasonalSonnets series brings together its two bases - Shakespeare and disability - through the combination of the character of Richard III and the fact that today is the UN's International Day of People with Disabilities. Both are extremely important (and very controversial) within disability activism circles, for similar reasons. With regards to the International Day, in a continuation of the debate around terminology I wrote about in my post on UKDHM, many people prefer to call it the International Day of Disabled People. I'm fine with either, although as I said previously, I do quite like the person-first language.

Richard is also a point of contention. Many people feel that his characterisation perpetuates the stereotype of a 'deformed' body signifying a 'deformed' mind. Indeed, the disability studies scholars David Mitchell and Sharon Snyder use his role as the central evidence for their theory of 'narrative prothesis' - where they claim that every fictional portrayal of disability uses it as a metaphor for something else. 

Whilst I have found their work very interesting and thought-provoking, I have difficulty sharing this particular opinion - not least because we now have documented evidence of his profound scoliosis. It seems to me, instead, that Shakespeare actually has a deep understanding of the difficulties posed by life with a disability in a society that neither understands nor accepts physical or mental difference. Moreover, although my own response to my condition is almost the complete opposite of Richard's - I prefer to focus on love and optimism over hatred and bitterness - I do understand where many of his emotions may have sprung from as a result of the attitudes of the people around him. Whereas my own feelings of inadequacy (which I'm working on) lead me to try and protect others and help in any way possible, for him, the only outlet for his self-loathing is to turn it against his 'enemies'.

This is by no means an excuse, of course, but I think it's really important to acknowledge the various ways in which people respond to being ostracised - and he's one of my favourite roles to play because, at points (especially in the opening monolgue) it feels like my beloved bard has a direct line into the most insecure part of my soul.

So, with that in mind, I present to you today's offering - along with my approximation of the 'white rose of the House of York' as a 'light drawing'.

I hope it's worthy:

3^rd December

This verse today combines two topic threads

that’re intricately connected to its form –

and (as though the world could glimpse inside my head) –

two reasons why my project here was born.

For December third’s the International Day

that the UN has set for disabil'ty

and, last night, I went to a Shakespeare play

whose central role has issues with mobil'ty.

His name is Richard, and he is also ‘Third’,

born prematurely, ‘sent before his time’ –

and ‘twas through him I finally found the words

t’express my own feelings by way of Shax’s rhyme.

For whilst his bitter outlook’s not like mine,

our social struggle’s stayed the same ‘cross time.  

Copyright Jessi Parrott December 2016

#SeasonalSonnets: 2nd Dec.

Hello my dear readers, and welcome to the second instalment of my #SeasonalSonnets series, for December 2nd. This morning's entry isn't quite as upbeat as yesterday's (far from it, actually!) but that's okay, because the aim of this project is to highlight the two facets of support I find in this type of poetry - it helps me both to remain positive and to process the tougher parts of my life.

This piece is about the difficulties I'm having with one of the newer recruits to my team of personal assistants, so I feel I should clarify a few things. Firstly, the more negative sections are entirely anonymous and she will have no possibility of reading it as we are not connected on any form of social media. Secondly, although it's been inspired by the actions of an individual, it's really a more general expression of my worry and frustrations regarding the situations I find myself in in relation to personal care. Thirdly, whilst I do make specific and special mention of my wonderful Fiona (which she wholeheartedly deserves!) for the convenient rhyme of her name, I am of course forever grateful to the other people who have stuck it out with me - some over the course of many years.

Following that preamble, here's the poem, along with another of my 'light drawings' that suitably evokes both the mood of the piece and the weather today.  I hope you enjoy and, if so, please do pop by tomorrow for more.

2nd December

I’m trying to be grateful I’ve a voice,

that I can use to speak aloud and say:

“Employing you for ‘care’ is not a choice,

you’ve left me in the lurch, it’s not okay!”

Truth is, I only say it in my head,

or softly so that none but I can hear,

or else she might not help me out of bed –

a prospect filled with naught but dread and fear.

For then I’d be denied a proper life,

and not write theses* or hang out with friends,

but wallow in a place of pain and strife

to which there ‘d seem no independent end.

My song this week’s “Thank goodness for Fiona,

for (without her) I’d truly be alone(r)”.

*NB: I’m writing just a ‘thesis’, singular, but the plural scanned better for the purposes of this poem. Don’t worry – I’m sensible!

Copyright Jessi Parrott December 2016

 

#SeasonalSonnets: 1st Dec.

Hello my dear readers

What's this, you say, a post on a Thursday!? Why yes - following last night's discussion of poetry and the solace I find in it, I'm breaking with convention (quelle surprise!) to announce a new feature for this blog - a venture in verse that will hopefully last for the duration of December. As you will gather from the title, I'm calling it #SeasonalSonnets. This is for two reasons. Firstly, I don't want to ally it with any particular festival, because in our house we celebrate an amalgam of the Judeo-Christian traditions under the name of either Christmukkah or Channumas - and charting that will just get too complex, especially as my priority is preparing for my PhD upgrade. Secondly, I may not quite manage to upload every day, and 'seasonal' is helpfully vague.

For now, though, I do plan that this will survive well - so here is the first entry, along with a suitably atmospheric light drawing. I wrote this early this morning as I looked out my window. Hope you enjoy and, if you do, come back for another tomorrow!

1^st December

 

I look outside my window and I see

a lovely but deceptive sky of blue

above a scattered carpet of red leaves

which,  of the chill, provides the only clue.

From them I know that I must wrap up warm,

for, without layers, I cannot be sure

my body will be sensible and calm

to let me get work done today (and more).

Yet somehow still I find I am serene,

not like the (long gone) days of undergrad,

‘cause grown up me knows that cold doesn’t mean

for definite my spasms will be bad.

Today I feel the joy of a December

much different from the last few I remember.

Copyright Jessi Parrott December 2016

 

#WordyandWheelyWednesdays: Sonnets for my Sanity

Hello my dear readers and welcome to yet another #WordyandWheelyWednesdays post where I'm writing about something different from what I expected to be. (This seems to be becoming a habit!)

Those of you who know me 'in real life' will most likely be aware that I write poetry. Often, especially when I'm stressed or need a more structured emotional outlet, this poetry takes the form of sonnets. In an effort to honour the pledge I made in last week's post (but have been working on for some time) to be more celebratory of my difference, I have found myself writing them more regularly. Indeed, over the last little while, what I thought was a sporadic smattering of verses usually penned in breaks from PhD work has become a more substantial project. Still only in breaks from my PhD, mind you, but more than just the occasional verse.

These poems have allowed me time to reflect on my thesis, my body, and the way that these two things are inextricably intertwined yet also almost mutually destructive - and I've come to rely on their fourteen lines as a slice of sanity in a cake that can sometimes feel as if it's filled with nothing but confusion and chaos. So much so that I now have quite a few, and I plan to keep going.

I'm not quite sure where they'll all end up, but may publish some on here, if that would be of interest?

Let me know - for now, though, I'm just sending love and thanks to you all for putting up with my ponderings - and offering you the picture below, which is my desktop background, and represents my 'mind's eye'! Pretentious, moi!?

Copyright Jessi Parrott 2015-