Dyslexia

by Chris Bullard

For Jeph

Because a willful gene somehow misread
The promptings in those twists of DNA
That grant to others easy passageway
Through thicketed words, you inherited
A lexicon of chaos, where, instead
Of lines of thought arranged in neat wordplay,
Your mind, though keen, found only disarray
And senseless letters, alpha unto zed.
Yet, you have trained yourself to write.
So as the discipline of your own will
Gave to the motions of your body skill
And acts repeated well gave you delight
In games, may you, with things to say, impart
By grace of practice meaning to your art.

Chris Bullard is a native of Jacksonville, FL. He lives in Collingswood, NJ, and works for the federal government as an Administrative Law Judge. He attended the University of Pennsylvania and is currently enrolled in the writing program at Wilkes University. His work has appeared in Nimrod, Pleiades, Atlanta Review and other literary magazines. Plan B Press expects to publish his chapbook, You Must Not Know Too Much, this year.