The fear swallows me whole,
As i contemplate ‘What if’,
What if I am subject to this cruel disease,
That forces you to want to drive off a cliff.

Precipitating your brain to slowly bleed,
Unable to walk without stumbling,
Causing your body to quiver and shake,
Whilst your head over heels tumbling.

Oh, this barbarous defect they call HD.
Stealing away your ability to think,
To eat without choking uncontrollably,
Before you even have the chance to blink.

Your independence is robbed,
As your lonely words become stuttered,
And it’s very heartbreaking to know,
There’s nothing that can stop your mind from being cluttered.

No medicine that can do the healing,
Leaving you isolated and encumbered,
I feel the ache suffocating my soul,
When I realise my years could be numbered.

If I have happen to have this gene,
No children there will be,
For it would be pure evil,
To inflict this same misery forced upon me.

So until I get tested,
To know my terminal fate,
My dream to have my own family,
Will remain a fantasy I may obliterate.

Because no matter how much I long for them,
It would be too unfair of me to give,
To tear away their innocence,
Without giving them a chance to live.


Josie Murphy