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.

i miss you so much it hurts my whole body.
do you remember when we talked about going to seattle?
you said you liked the rain
and the fact that no one there would know you,
i just wanted to be wherever you were.
i was never afraid of the dark
when you talked about yours.
i still don't have words for what i felt
when you told me the only other number
you had saved in your phone apart from your mother's was mine.
i keep telling myself you're not allowed
to just exit and re-enter my life as you please,
but i leave the door unlocked,
so what does that make me?
the last "i love you" from the last time we spoke,
is still stuck to the roof of my mouth.
other lovers have tried to pry it out of me,
but the memory of you is like lockjaw.
i miss you so much it hurts my whole body.
do you remember the lizard you caught last summer?
you let me name him forrest.
if life is a box of chocolates,
there are pieces missing,
and whatever is left has gone stale.
i can't smoke cigarettes in my backyard anymore
without wondering where you are
or if you're smoking too.
i hope you're not drinking,
i know you hate what it does to you.
your secrets are still tucked between my ribs,
i will hold them safe and repeat them back to you
if you ever lose your way home.
i miss you so much it hurts my whole body.
do you remember when you told me
about the person you were afraid of becoming,
i said i wasn't scared,
and i told you i was proud of you?
i'm still proud of you.
i hope you're in school or at least keeping busy.
i hope you still make yourself laugh.
i miss you so much it hurts my whole body.
do you remember what movie we were watching
the night you got arrested?
i still can't finish it.
i am holding the place.
can we pick up where we left off?
can we stand up and wipe the dust off?
i never got to tell you why i only write in pen,
or why i can't sleep with socks on,
or about the day i caught god with his hands in a public fountain
fishing for change.
i'm not mad at you for disappearing, but i'm lonely.
the only reason i haven't called
is because i'm afraid of being sent straight to voicemail,
but if i ever find myself in indiana again,
you'll be the first to know.

- m.f.

Have you ever gotten lockjaw?
At least, that's what I think it is
when my mouth stretches
to let in a yawn, or out a sigh.
My tongue recedes
for the muscles underneath pull taut.
It hurts to keep open,
and it hurts to try and close.
I cannot speak
yet I cannot seem to keep silent.
But this is only for a moment,
one that I long for,
as silly as that sounds.

It reminds me of talking to you

Let's go with two exclamation points

Rip the air from my lungs
Shriveled and lonely and pink inside
The flesh dancing the salsa for a breath

Atrophied arms reaching out
Locked like my mouth

(Screaming for a kind word)

I have never been without it
The scent of regret surrounds me
Every mistake I ever made
Is the stench that so confounds me

Soaring heights of anxiety
I have never been without it
Not your garden variety
Plaguing much of society

How I long to be free of it
Unrelenting regret believed
I have never been without it
Dry heaving nightmares unrelieved

Trichinosis, lockjaw strangles
My regret knows all about it
Like Joe Btfsplk’s* cloud dangles
I have never been without it

i am being aimlessly guided by a decrepit side street.
the smell of who-knows-what hangs in the still like an occupied noose
as i strain to ignore the unpleasant moisture on my brow,
the imperceptible perspiration of emotional exertion.

my heels can decipher the coded cracks in the concrete
and converse with muffled clackings that echo from alleyway walls.
they say, "our coordinates are flawless; this is the path to freedom."
i think, to reach it alone would be more bitter than any confinement.

‘cause i left some love in an empty room miles from here—
it’s collecting cobwebs instead of affections
while the idol of unrequited passion burns
and its ashes are faxed to four far corners of a hardhearted world.

i reach a dead end and feel the breath catch in my throat.
there is nothing here but the empty cocoons of the homeless
who have hopefully lifted themselves on dusty wings to a better place
leaving me searching for signs of life in the litter they've left behind.

there is a poster haphazardly taped to the bricks;
no lettering, no information, just the face of a man.
he stares blankly at me from his paper veranda
as if i were a television set, some mundane form of entertainment.

then, unexpectedly, a hole rips through the flyer
to compensate for the boot-clad leg freeing itself from dried pulp
and stepping heavily onto the pavement below.
i stumble back in mixed horror and disbelief as appendages creep lividly from the wall

until the man with the advertised face stands before me.
he pulls a pack of parliaments from his trenchcoat pocket
and wordlessly offers me one as his lighter births infant flame.
soon, the nicotine fog hangs like an opaque grey curtain between us.

then the silence is shattered, with shards of stillness breaking against the asphalt.
"i hope you weren't attempting to be stealthy. i could hear you for miles."
the voice emitted is raspy, the sound of a dull razorblade on the neck of a convict.
i shiver fiercely in response with a zero-kelvin cold.

a frankenstein hand fights through the smoke to grasp my ashen face.
his finger to my lips is a canker sore forming.
"a pretty lil' thing like you shouldn't be caught dead in this mess."
his forked tongue forms the words of nothing i don't already know.

i push him away. "just cut to the chase. we don't need to drag this out.
you know what i came here for, so let's get it over with."
my heart spasms in protest, but i suppress it with clenched fists.
as it dejectedly thuds in my chest, i can taste the bile rising in my throat.

he raises an eyebrow, then sniggers, showing off a yellow shark-toothed grin.
"the princess has a temper! well, you've come a long way for this, sweet cheeks."
he reaches into his coat, pulls out his leather gauntlets blackened with singe.
"say exactly what you need, doll, and your old pal lucifer will handle the rest."

my lungs deflate, punctured by pins and needles of stale air
and the blood dries in my veins like cruel sun blistering the desert.
half of me begs for lockjaw. the other half manipulates the corners of my mouth.
"erase him from my mind. i can't spend my life obsessing."

a glint of guilty pleasure in the devil's red eye seals the deal.
soul extraction's just like getting a tooth pulled, i tell myself regretfully.
it's just another part you don't need, a bland and disposable item.
but it doesn't quell the fear; i'm shaking hard enough to register on a richter scale.

the man in black embraces me, grasping my ribcage in his massive gloved hands.
a flash of doubt sears through me, yet i stand frozen, crucified.
i feel satan's minions pulling at memories like loose strings
and there is chanting in my ears; evolnilr igafognir effuseht eta ivellai sihth tiw.



i come to with dry heaves and a migraine sent from hell itself
to find that i am home in bed with the sheets around my ankles.
i rise and move to the mirror, see the dark circles traced around my eyes,
and dissolve into sobs without knowing why.

remember when you told me sleep was just practice? remember how when i asked what for, all you could manage was sea-foaming at the mouth and tired eyes?

funny how i see in black and white now. funny how i can still see sea-foam-blue.

one of the many things you taught me was to always keep eulogies tucked between my ribs in hopes of memorizing them by heart. i never knew heart break until words i can't remember writing—or, maybe, wont remember writing came spilling out of my mouth like reverse lockjaw.

but i remember the way you choked up and coughed out apologies as if you were fighting tides of pride; words getting caught in your throat—a foreshadowing of salt the water in your lungs.

i know i tend to ramble, and i know you tend to hate that but i swear god this had a point. i guess what i'm trying to say is, i never meant to be your anchor. i never wanted to drag you down.

Falling hard for someone I hardly know
I think of him and then my heart clenches
The way I feel for him , I want to show
But when I'm close, I stop within inches

I don't want to hold it in much longer
If I do I'll explode from head to toe
Maybe I'll say something to be stronger
It's not as if he'll hate me, be a foe

I step closer to him, voice calling out
My mouth snaps shut, my legs frozen in place
I have lockjaw, what is this all about
I can't step closer, my heart starts to race

I will wait for him to step toward me
What if he won't come, then we'll never be