'Flash' writing anthology about chronic pain - submissions welcome!
I sit in my place—the patient’s chair—prepared to be a partner in my care. I’ve brought an expanding bible of medical tests and consultant notes, a list of medications and interventions, including what has worked and what hasn’t, and a diary of symptoms I now describe with familiarity. Muscles spasm in my core when I […]
We pay the cable from the reel in staggers, jerk the squiggly line between the bushes, wake the minor aches, the none too vicious graters in the knee that love to grab us. Nothing lightweight in the gear for this one: the Black and Decker like a struggling toddler; the squeaky derricks of our legs […]
by Sara Wasson U.K.
PAIN AND ITS KILLERS relief is an acceptable inevitable storm-head alarm that holds back its rain and mumbles thunder instead a hard-sell of cotton ignorance on the sofa that’s the world MOON the days hurt and the nights – well they’re a VHS video-nasty trembling on pause I only hope the the moon knows why […]
Anon. Germany
Work as hard as you can for as long as you can Then you’re ill can’t work can’t walk can’t bear talk or remember how no pain felt can count on the hand you can’t lift your friends and family can’t work or provide can’t afford pride or holidays you manage Christmas, on plastic can’t […]
M.E. destroys one life and ruins more. Fatigue replaces rage. Accept it. by Linda Cosgriff Author website United Kingdom
A man is ill. Whispered recollections of what he once was are all that sustain him. He has no hope. His aching visions of what should have been kill comfort. What could have been is a lie. He has no hope. He has no future. He has only now. Life took revenge for a life […]
Pain stitched into each joint, he withers and fades. A mutilated life. by Linda Cosgriff Author website United Kingdom
On Scarborough beach, I played football. This image is one of my new paintings. It is autobiographical and consists of two halves. One half reflects my early life growing up in Neepsend, an industrial area of Sheffield. The other half depicts me, as a child, on the beach with my football. by Paul […]