Repeated words, no scratch that repeated sounds
Like a scratched record played too much
Because that's your mom’s jam.
R-r-repeated sounds wh-whe-when my palms start to sweat
Like wet leaves that lie on the ground after a rainy fall day.

My stutter is a mutter rewinded and played r-r-rewinded and p-p-played.
Words stay beneath my bumpy tongue,
In between the gapped teeth my mom won’t let me fix,
Yet she repaired my impairment.
“People need to hear what you have to say in whole parts”
“But ma if the sum of its parts are as great as its whole,
Then why must I get rid of a piece of me to fit within the bar graph
Of snot nosed kids that can’t ride a 2 wheeler,
That can’t find the beat,
That can't read above the average 2nd grader.”
I was okay with it being gone when I was 11,
Because I was fresh like wet paint on the cemented walls of this little school.

So, I was fine not being the giggle after each word.
You laugh because I speak with a shiver,
Because my alphabet has 52 constant letters,
Because I avoided speaking until I was given
My daily dose of dietary confined blue pills.
Blue pills that make my stomach ball up,
Like a folded fitted sheet,
The blue pills that cause
My brain to send EEG waves off of the screen
And spill onto the cold hard floor
For only 8 hours of complete focus,
And for me to speak clearly.

To speak with stone rather than pebbles
to speak with such precision
My chin must be tilted at the best 90 degree angle the Greeks would've seen,
So the sharpness of my words
Finesse of my vernacular
And the scissors of every accent that fills my eclectic roots
To cut through my teeth.

I hate this.
I hate that if I don't take my cotton ball pills
I can't sleep with my body half on half off
Like a light switch carefully stagnant in the middle.
I can't look the way I want to look
Because my brain moves faster than Ricky Bobby
And for me to say my thoughts I have to
L-l-leave and r-r-return to the s-s-same place
Like getting groceries from the car.

I heard Wayne Brady used to stutter
& he's funny
He can sing, well I guess I'm Wayne Brady
“Wwwelcome ttto wh-whose line is it anyway”
That could be me but I'm stuck at this round table
With a sweating glass of water
& a starchy pill folded within my hands.