CRPS, or Complex Regional Pain Syndrome (Type 1), is a change in the nervous system that's usually triggered by a very painful episode. The bad kinds affect the brain, nerves, muscles, skin, metabolism, circulation, and fight-or-flight response. Lucky me; that's what I've got. ... But life is still inherently good (or I don't know when to quit; either way) and, good or not, life still goes on.

Friday, December 16, 2011

I intend

I intend to die a hale and hearty old bitch,
rounding Cape Hatteras on a blowy day
in a boat far too light for the waters
but light enough for me;
or flying over fences on my blooded
or bloody-minded Arab mare,
a feisty brat after my own heart,
one fence too far.

Sudden and fierce it should be.
Nobody I've never met should profit
from my slow and tortured death,
acceding in misery
to what the doctor thinks is best.

Their training is not that good.

Pharma doesn't train my best healers.
Only wind and waves and good rich earth
can give what I need, or take it at the end.

7 comments:

  1. I love it! from Al Marshall

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  2. Beautiful, Isabel. Fierce and brave and true. For me, too, dying some kind of death which is not hospital mediated is a huge priority.
    And grief transmogrified into action is so powerful. I wish for you comfort for the grief and strength for the action.
    Lili

    PS: It reminds me a little of a poem I wrote many years ago after yet another anaphylactic reaction:


    Deathwish

    I’d like to dance myself to death
    or die from flying too high

    I’d like to die suddenly
    while swimming with seals
    and sink to the sea witch’s cave

    I’d like to die at the moment of my birth
    with a total eclipse in the sky

    I’d like to die while being brave
    doing some noble deed
    while risking my neck

    I’d like to die a contented old woman
    asleep and dreaming of love and sex

    I could embrace a death such as these….

    (I don’t want to die gasping for breath.)

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  3. May that be a long and hale way off :)

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  4. I remember you clinging to the back of an Arab mare with the wind in your hair and a look of joy on you face. I miss the desert

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  5. I hope your book will come out and i can read it all it is soo good :) keep going hun
    Saara

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  6. I really do think, Isy, that you're the most interesting person I have thus far had the pleasure of meeting on my journey with CRPS! Your blog never ceases to keep me entertained reading!!!

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