K. A. Ryan

Impairment by Default

Mid-dive, I would vocalize "oh no!"
Mom would again be holding a blow-dryer,
hoping not to melt my moulds. After a few
minutes of my hearing aids shhhing, beeping, booping, and eeeee-ing,
I could clearly hear her laughter.

Rain and sleet sometimes freeze the tubes
and sometimes freeze the aids. The familiar
sounds of failure ring through my sidekicks as I walk,
protecting them with my hands; hats and umbrellas forgotten.
Only once did I get halfway to the bus stop, before I realized
I couldn't hear the cars. I ran back home
and mom was standing just inside the door waiting.

During parent-teacher conferences, mother all but held
my hands to my sides so I didn't turn my outer ears off.
Later, she delivered lectures about me
having to listen to lectures at school.
I'd sometimes pretend my batteries died.

Shrill bluejays and cooing mourning doves accompany
the noisy feedback. I need new moulds again.
The old ones protrude from my ears because my skin
is sore and raw from scratching. At night, I cover
my dead ears with pillows. It doesn't feel right,
letting them breathe.

The Poem that Took the Place of a Mountain
(title borrowed from Wallace Stevens)

I am a bad daughter.
My mother is a bad mother.
We cannot exist
without knowing the other
is safe, sound,
stupid.

Everything is a fight.
Everything is a molehill.
Everything leads us to open
the gates of neuroses.
My mother reacts,
always,

with a hyperbolic flair
where she constantly asks rhetorical questions.
I hold onto her words, place them carefully
in my temporal lobes
(which are located next to my deaf ears)
and await analysis.

The vastness between us,
the variance, the melodrama;
I fear I may gently
go insane.