Renee Chaisson
DIMENUENDO
Is this it?
Why didn't they tell me this was all I was going to get?
I would have done things so much better
I would have grown a garden
And given you cherry tomatoes.
I would have learned to speak French
And helped you practice your accent.
I would have travelled to secret places;
There are things that I have not smelled or touched yet.
My photo albums would have been your favorite bed-time story.
I would have carried my own oxygen to the bottom of the ocean
And told you all about the octopus there
How its sticky limbs felt on my arm and
How I was scared
But brave and delighted at the same time.
Not like now
I am not brave now
And I am not delighted.
I have nothing to give you – no cherry tomatoes and no help
I run out of things to tell you because I have told you all there is to me
And there is no more to come.
Renee Chaisson grew up on beautiful Vancouver Island and she is proud to be raising
her daughter there as a single mother. In the past, she has worked as both Early Childhood Educator
and an Educational Assistant with the local School District. She is currently on disability due
to a chronic illness called Myalgic Encephalomyelitis. Chaisson's poetry is based upon her experience of
living with that disability.
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