Scoliosis

Some women in my family have idiopathic scoliosis

My sister, my mother's sister, myself, along with

Two or three percent of the population 

We have off-center centers

Topsy-turvy bones

Sometimes while I am lying

In bed trying to sleep

I feel the curvature, the

Wrongness of it

I can’t get comfortable 

Only puberty could cause such a

Confusion

A three-dimensional abnormality --

I want to know what happened on the other side

That scared the spine from its cradle

It must be an imperceptible imbalance

It must be an inherent flaw

A glitch in the program

That built our fine faces 

Our dark hair and strange skeletons

If I say we’re crazy

I mean it in the good way

I mean we’re crazy determined 

I mean we like to speak our truth 

And look you in both eyes

It turns out that even small differences

Make you more interesting

And if you don’t pretend 

Your idiosyncrasies are invisible 

You might grow stronger in the strange place.