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From: Steve Brown
Date: 04 Oct 2000
Time: 09:25:23
Remote Name: spider-tn064.proxy.aol.com
This poem was published in slightly different form in Steven E. Brown, PAIN, PLAIN AND FANCY RAPPINGS: POETRY FROM THE DISABILITY CULTURE (Available from Institute on Disability Culture, 2260 Sunrise Point Rd., Las Cruces, NM 88011 1995, $5.00). Thanks to Dara for helping to make it better. Steve
TELL YOUR STORY
TELL YOUR STORY TELL YOUR STORY It may bump from the page like words of braille sizzling in tales of blazing glory; it may glisten in the sunshine like the holy grail, so tell me a tale, even if it's gory, I'm yearning to hear YOU Tell YOUR story.
Have you heard 'bout the man in the motorized chair? Found no ramp at the movie theater did he despair? No, just let them dudes lift him in there. Came back a few days later after somethin' greater brought with him a crew people in chairs just grew and grew, said they knew they'd be part of the view; no problem getting in, just lift and push and move those hunks of tin. The chairs, they weighed a-plenty, The ushers stressed and strained and got somewhat benty. Seeing the movie was not the goal changin' the stage was the whole they paid for gettin' in but that theater knew it sinned. People in chairs sealed their own personal stamp on that theater's shimmering new wheelchair ramp.
Tell your story Tell your story It may enrapture the floating air like ASL* singing its flair it might even glisten like the holy grail, but no one will set their sail toward your tale, even if it's hunky-dory, unless you tell your story Tell YOUR story.
Once I knew a lady got caught in a picket line changed her whole design: came back to her hometown mission bound. Told a hospital it was ailing cause it was failing to see good health bound in the key of phone lines hooked up with a TDD.** Said she'd seek cooperation or she'd be mighty angry might even round up folks and stoke fires of insurgency, gather signatures and seek publicity. You know that hospital saw the light put an end to the no TDD blight. last time I saw that lady she was waving a sign telling a TV station she sure did mind no news she could see so why should she listen to what they wanted her to be. Now she knows how to stick it with a picket and her pockets have been lined with Advocacy.
Tell your story Tell your tale You will find you touch with the sureness of a crutch a framework for your dwelling, a story needing telling, steaming like a sunburnt trail glistening like the holy grail. Who will know what you entail unless you risk the path to glory tell your story Tell YOUR story.
Does he want another cup of coffee? I heard the waitress ask about the man. How did I know his plan just cause he couldn't see didn't mean his brain rested in incompetency. The stories he has told brisk and bold I've shared with more than a few over a cup of coffee or a tall, cold brew.
The lessons are in the telling they provide a framework and a dwelling. We all have so many stories to bear Cry, laugh, sing, and despair; how will our children learn and compare if we're too timid to dare to raise the flare share that we care.
Tell your story Sing your tale Tell OUR story Shout OUR glory!
Tell our story Tell our story It may not bring fame It may have no glory, but cut through someone's life like a ray of sunshine break away barriers like a layer of turpentine, tell your story Tell your tale We're not as elusive as that holy grail.
*ASL: American Sign Language is a the language of the Deaf Culture.
**TDD: A Telecommunications Device for the Deaf (TDD); more often today called TTY (Teletypewriter) is a device that looks like a typewriter and attaches to a telephone to enable people with hearing and speech impairments to communicate via the telephone line.