Changing the Rules

Intro

This spoken word piece was inspired by the #MPprompt:

“Write me a poem about what its like to live in YOUR body.”

Some struggles arrive loudly. Others settle quietly into everyday routines, until caution, discomfort, exhaustion, and uncertainty begin shaping even the smallest parts of a day. This spoken word piece came from thinking about what it means to live inside a body that cannot always be trusted, and the difficult balance between frustration, adaptation, and continuing anyway.

The audio version below is the intended experience, though the full text is included underneath for anyone unable to listen.

Full text of Changing the Rules

Living in this body
is signing contracts
written in disappearing ink.

A bowl of comfort food
cooling on the table

the kind of meal
people describe with words like safe

until three hours later
my stomach folds itself
like a fist
around broken glass.

No warning sirens.
No red lights.
Just another food
quietly added
to the growing list of betrayals.

Even hunger feels complicated now.

The grocery store hums
while I stand in an aisle
reading ingredients
like a man diffusing explosives.

Contains traces of.
Processed near.
May include.
May destroy your afternoon.

My body has become
an unreliable narrator.

Then there is the mind.

That beautiful broken radio
searching every frequency for danger.

Trauma leaves fingerprints everywhere.
On sleep.
On silence.
On the sound of an unanswered text message.

Anxiety turns the nervous system
into a smoke detector
wired directly to memory.

The next morning arrives.
I drink water.
Tie my shoes.
And attempt hope
one more time.