Slow

Slow

There’s lines all over my life 
Some stand between myself and others 
Building boundaries where I am finally comfortable 
Others are queues I stand in watching everyone get goals before me 
Grades, graduation, validation, varying 
Levels of success that others say are normal

Years of learning to read a certain way 
This works for everyone so why cant it work for you? 
A high school’s worth of adaptation and confrontation that 
This isn’t working for me but I found what does.
The lines in my life move, scrambled like scrabble 
3 points for a B but only if it doesn’t look like a D.
Years of minding my Ps and Q’s because apparently they differ
Pardon my politeness for I am slow 

Reading aloud always sounds like a eulogy 
Mourning the loss of the words I meant to say 
Instead the brain substitutes and institutes an easier alternative 
For me to manage and say 
Or stutter and stammer and try to force out 
Only to be told
you got it wrong again 

Numbers make sense to me in a different way 
I can read it once then say another 
Yet warped, reversed and wrong 
Calculations feel like abrasions, after a while it got better 
Chipping away at the wall between the eyes and the brain
Eventually gluing things together 
Excuse my intelligence for I am slow

Diagnosis is a word I can hardly spell 
And something I hardly gained 
Hours of ‘tell me what is wrong in this line’ 
when I’m looking at a circle
Expressing myself and grasping for explanations I can’t find
I know the words but I don’t know the words
An adult treated like a child because it took too long to notice 
Reconciliation works slowly and silently 

Getting to the right people was half the battle 
The other half is writing my name on the moving line 
Extra time for reading and dreaming of when 
My ability matches my capability.
Frustration of how little I can push myself but, 
Forgive my fortitude for I am not slow 

K Robertson

Slow

There’s lines all over my life 
Some stand between myself and others 
Building boundaries where I am finally comfortable 
Others are queues I stand in watching everyone get goals before me 
Grades, graduation, validation, varying 
Levels of success that others say are normal

Years of learning to read a certain way 
This works for everyone so why cant it work for you? 
A high school’s worth of adaptation and confrontation that 
This isn’t working for me but I found what does.
The lines in my life move, scrambled like scrabble 
3 points for a B but only if it doesn’t look like a D.
Years of minding my Ps and Q’s because apparently they differ
Pardon my politeness for I am slow 

Reading aloud always sounds like a eulogy 
Mourning the loss of the words I meant to say 
Instead the brain substitutes and institutes an easier alternative 
For me to manage and say 
Or stutter and stammer and try to force out 
Only to be told
you got it wrong again 

Numbers make sense to me in a different way 
I can read it once then say another 
Yet warped, reversed and wrong 
Calculations feel like abrasions, after a while it got better 
Chipping away at the wall between the eyes and the brain
Eventually gluing things together 
Excuse my intelligence for I am slow

Diagnosis is a word I can hardly spell 
And something I hardly gained 
Hours of ‘tell me what is wrong in this line’ 
when I’m looking at a circle
Expressing myself and grasping for explanations I can’t find
I know the words but I don’t know the words
An adult treated like a child because it took too long to notice 
Reconciliation works slowly and silently 

Getting to the right people was half the battle 
The other half is writing my name on the moving line 
Extra time for reading and dreaming of when 
My ability matches my capability.
Frustration of how little I can push myself but, 
Forgive my fortitude for I am not slow 

K Robertson