Spanish influenza
walking pneumonia
icepick headache
common cold
whooping cough
Diabetes
anorexia
getting old

flat foot
bad back
heel spur
heart attack
spasticus
autisticus
tongue tied
amb(i)dextrous

my weakness
is my forte
my sickness is  my skill
my illness
is my realness
it makes my life a thrill

Trying to fight this
bronchitis
gangrene
runny nose
frostbite
tooth decay
hat hair
broken bones

bed bound
shell-shocked
flea ridden
sinusitis
cholera
dropsy
eliphantitis
out-all-nightis

wom­b fever
winter fever
black water fever
remitting fever
ship fever
jail fever
camp fever
or schizophrenia

scarlet fever
tuberculosis
American plague
rock n roll
Wheezing
Paralysed
Got gas
In both holes

rabies
scabies
rickets
and SARS
man flu
bird flu
swine flew
from Mars

multiple sclerosis
tennis elbow-sis
stomach ulcers
and leukaemia
night blindness
hypothermia
lung cancer
sickle-cell anaemia

French pox
Lockjaw
Polio
Gout
Nostalgia
Dropsy
Knocked right
Out

Stuttering
Bellyacher
Anti-social
Leprosy
Sleep walker
Sleep talker
Absent minded
OCD

Tourettes, ****
Pyromania
tonsillitis
Conjunctivitis
Food poisoned!
Warted over
My Psoriasis
(Will I survive this?)

Measles
Malaria
Meningitis
Migraine
Scrum-pox
Worm fit
Water on
the brain

apparitions
seeing things
rattly chest
bad breath
la duzi
tormentation
inflammation
black death

measles
malaria
migrane
mumps
leprosy
lice and
leg bone
lumps

kleptomania
bubonic plague
black *****
feeling ****
bone shave
falling sickness
wanna stop
just cant quit

Huntington's and
Parkingson's and
Hare-lipped
Hay fever
Typhoid fever
Glandular fever
Night fever
And Hysteria

intellectual
dyslexia
dysfunctional
family
cancer crab
stillborn twin
bad blood
epilepsy

Parking spot
disabilities
all the wounds in
all the militaries
pity thee with
lost agility
lost babes or
infertility

ear infection
starvation
Hepatitis
E to A
smallpox
chicken pox
cow pox
what a day

tuberculosis
stuttering
panic stricken
star struck
scurvy
shingles
headless chicken
bad luck


paranoid
in the void
premature
*******
stomach ulcers
feeble pulses
chronicled
*******

autistic
gallstones
double-jointe­d
wrists and knees
consumption
bad digestion
quinsy palsy
ticks and fleas

amnesia
typhus
amnesia
heart failure
radiation
cholera
amnesia
bad behaviour

Hypochondriac?
By gosh, no!
Poorly are ye?
‘Fraid so.


nostalgia
        suffer me
wanderlust
suffer me
insomnia
suffer me
loneliness
let me be



god
complex
mother
complex
father
complex
ego
complex

­

its complicated
im superior
its complicated
im inferior
its complicated
im a short man
got ingrown hairs
got a bad tan



im suffering
ocd
im suffering
obesity
im suffering
jealousy
xenophobia
and nosebleeds



stokholm
syndrome
toxic shock
syndrome
got it down
syndrome
irritable bowel
syndrome

yellow nail
syndrome
stevens-johnson
syndrome
restless leg
syndrome
shoulder-hand
syndrome

lambert-eaton
syndrome
mi­ddle-lobe
syndrome
mobius
syndrome
pickwickian
syndrome

post rubella
syndrome
riley day
syndrome
straight back
syndrome
ulysess
syndrome



alcoholics
we are prone
drug addicts
we are prone
mind benders
we are prone
fortune spenders
we are prone



My illness, my illness
My illness is my realness

*Pick it up
Tide it over
Fight it off or
Cave in

Save it
Suffer it
Pass it on
When its Raining

bleed him
restrain him
shave his
head

he went from being
quite well
to being quite
dead.

Where are all thee open doors
Humanity is creating one big flaw
Mixed messages floating on radio waves
Sending next  generations to early graves.
Leukaemia ,cancers  ,Facebook  fungies
governments wool pulling over your eyes,
Phone and drug companies making trillions of pound
While we have blood in our bodies,no cure will be found.

The first time I saw you a bass was being cradled in your calloused hands.
Tousled hair
And I can't find the words to explain how ridiculous you looked covered in all that anger and the I'm too cool for anyone attitude.
It made me laugh
Your laugh made me laugh
It was contagious in the way that even if someone in the room hated you at the time they would release the smallest of smiles just because of you.
I don't have any photos of us left.
But I have memories worth a billion years.
The stupid code names and the stupidity in yourself

I remember the summer of 2009-2010 and how you became super reckless after you moved to New York and I moved back to Australia.
Jumping off your roof onto the trampoline
Getting into motorcycle crashes
I was 13 by then and you were 15 ready to take on the world
But you saw me as an equal
You saw all the things in me that no one else did
I was never a little girl to you
I was just...
Your girl
We kept each other just for each other
Not letting others affect out friendship or know about us to some extent
That's what made it
What made us so truthful

I remember when you told me about the leukaemia
I hated you
I yelled
Screamed
Cried
How could you let me in like that just to tell me that you're going to die soon and there's nothing I could do
And you didn't even tell me in person
You waited till I was back to the other side of the world
All those mystery appointments finally started making sense
You were dying the day I met you
You were dying when we played music together
You were dying when we had to say goodbye
Only I refused to say goodbye cause I was convinced I'd be back next vacation
I didn't get my goodbye
You were dying while I was flying over Europe
You were dying while I visited Paris and thought of you
You were dying while I travelled around India
While I celebrated my 13th birthday and you didn't know if you'd even make it to your 16th
You did though
But not your 17th
Or your 18th
Your 19th
20th?
And later this year your 21st
You didn't get to graduate
We didn't get to have our planned reunion
Or go on all those travel plans
Play music around the world
None of it came true
Because six months after your 15 they were scattering your ashes into the ocean.
So that you could go and visit every corner on the globe anyway

Tell me Zane
Is the world really as beautiful as we want it to be?
Because there's so much I could say about how much I hate it
How much I hate you having to go away
How I hate that I've spent the past four years not hearing your voice
How I hate that you chose to go away in the end
Because you knew you were dying and just like everything else you wanted control over it
You were so stubborn
And we fought so much
There'd be days where we would refuse that the other existed cause we both wanted hold over the situation
But in the end you'd scrunch up your eyes and I'd punch you lightly in the arms and everything was perfect

I miss you
More than anything
I'm constantly reaching into the air trying to grasp any remains of you
You would think after four years I would be used to it but the space that you occupied is empty and it's hard not to notice
I'm still drowning in the fact that you loved me as much as you said you did
I'm still praying that tomorrow when I wake up you'll be here
I'm still remembering conversations and tiny details
I'm still never going to let you go
Because even though you're not here, your the reason I'm still breathing.
I can never put all these feelings into words and if I had the time to write about you all the time, there would be a **** book saga by now and you would pay me out so much for it.
I love you Zane. So **** much. I've never stopped, I don't think I ever will because it's not possible.
Rest in peace my beautiful boy.

There is a silence now that you have gone
Somewhere - who knows where?
A silence of your suffering, your laughter,
Your excitement, your enjoyment of food.
A silence of your telephone calls, our lunches,
Your family get togethers, the Christmas puddings.
A silence of birthday cards, Sunday roasts,
Shopping trips, seaside walks and ice cream.
A silence filled with my children's laughter,
Summer picnic days and your flower garden.
A silence of your dementia voice, muddled
And forgetful in your inhabited, twilight world.
A silence of your tears and requests to go home
To safety and your memories of a past busy life.
A silence now that you are gone which I fill with
The voice you gave us to fight on your behalf,
That speaks with truth and grief and sadness
Screaming for your help, care and support.
There is a silence now that you have gone
It fills the deaf ears of those who won't hear
Your sorrow and our pain, who dismiss your
Diagnosis and replace it with a list of lesser
Tick boxes, low scores and minor symptoms.
A silence that is full of blood transfusions,
Infections, falls and fainting and fevers,
A silence that gave you leukaemia and took
Away your life, your heart and soul and being.
A silence that I promise to break very soon
For your silent voice needs to be loudly heard
So we can all rest in quiet,  everlasting peace
Knowing you're protected by God's 'Continuing Care'

God Bless Auntie Joan x

The doctors told her: “Leukaemia”.
More cancer? So I munched up Molly
and chain-smoked Benson
in the night club outdoor area.

The lights were stunning,.
We marched a half mile in heels
over frosted ground with knocking knees,
looking for people to please.

New Year’s Eve.
A house filled up to the brim
with big, fat eyes and dancing lovers
in a horrid estate in Sligo town.

2016 rang in, triumphantly.
I was surrounded by beautiful people
drowning in loud music
slept at 8am and dreamt of her.

Are some people born cursed
Are some people born
Halfway,incomplete and worthless
I am an unfinished painting
A painting that is seen and scorned
A painting that does not
represent  beauty
A painting that represents hideousness
A painting whose artist
Is misfortune
You can see his name
Engraved on my legs.

How can a man who can't stand
on his own two feet
Stand ,tall and proud
How can he be useful
When his legs are useless
I am seen as a defective machine
A machine that is incapable
of fulfilling any task
A prototype of a human being
A disadvantaged man placed
in a disadvantaged place
A man physically designed to be poor
A man who can never earn a living
A man whose life is not worth living.

I have one blessing in life
A friend that never leaves my side
A truly noble man who lacks pride
A man proud to walk
with an incomplete being
A friend who calls me
the greatest thing
A friend who calls me brother
He is my strength
Even though he is weak too
He is dying but he wants me to keep living
His blood screams in pain
I pray that one day
His leukaemia is slain
He would leave his death bed
For me to rest in true peace
This man should not know death
It should be me on my last breath.

A crippled man cannot work forever
Even in all my endeavours
They saw me as a liability
They let me go
I am deadweight
A man with no purpose
A crippled man
With a defective life.

My life came to a close
When the leukaemia took what mattered most
The ground wailed for me
know that my brother
will return to the soil
I remember his first words
"Paul keep on living " He said
Now I stare at his lifeless corpse
Wishing it was me who death took
I am just a crippled man
Nothing but broken  bones
Why should I l live when
the one who kept me alive is dead
Why should I stay in a world
that has no love for the crippled
Without my brother
I am truly incomplete.