4'9" and Fierce

Four Foot Nine and Fierce
(a villanelle) 

How are you still kind and strong
Like the lee of a wall in the height of a storm
When everything has gone so wrong?

Your tale should be a depressing song
A world of illness near since you were born
But I see you face life kind and strong.

The deaths of children, before long
Should leave a heart dry and torn
From everything that went so wrong.

From a diagnosis lived with overlong
Of multiple sclerosis drawn
How are you still kind and strong?

You fought the battle that Parkinson’s had brung
To a husband whose mind was worn
Away.  Dealt with everything that went so wrong.

You could be hard and angry when you were young
But age and pain must have shaped your form
Through everything that has gone so wrong
To a person who is kind and strong.


February 2023

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