I was a diagnosed as a Person with Parkinson’s three years ago, the first definite symptoms going back before COVID. Hence this slant take on the Onegin stanza, a particular form of fourteener, that is, a sonnet.
*
Sialorrhea, also known
as just plain drooling,
is an egregious symptom,
though thankfully not as grueling
as others I’ve got. It gives rise
to what is called, in Grecian guise,
dysphagia, hard swallowing.
Worse is what’s following.
It’s bad enough not to eat
to have lost your appetite.
But to gag and choke? My plight
and its inevitable suite
will come down to this:
the throes of death and rigor mortis.
Dysphonia, evening rasping
of the voice, loss of speech,
wild klutzy grasping
for objects fallen out of reach
(not to mention thought
not being where it ought)
—let them join a longer list: atonia,
anosmia, ataxia, anomia,
Feeling listless, torpid?
they call it akinesia;
spastic jerks, dyskinesia.
Easy to get morbid.
There are no fictions
In this litany of afflictions.
Waiting till the brain fog lifts
is no longer an option.
Meanwhile, as attention drifts,
I seek out every new concoction
Festination, unsteady gait
and fear of falling are my fate.
Whatever traveled up the vagus
nerve caused this ruckus.
Now the part of my poor brain
that normally dispenses
dopamine to calm my senses
continues inexorably to wane.
A new rule and hope, my first and last:
Festina lente. Go slow, not fast.