I, no I mean WE will not be defeated.
Now, hope might seem depleted
But I promise that at the end of the tunnel there is a light,
It might be small and barley in sight,
But it is there and it beckons for us to hold on,

Hold on to each other: our friends, our sisters, our brothers,
Because in a world full of hateful slurs,
Where name calling and bullying still occurs,
We need to see each other as more than just negative labels,
It is up to us to look into the eyes of hate and turn the tables,
You might look at that person different than you and call them names,
But all you do is lose sight of, that despite you trying to give them a new one, their name is James.

And James is a fricking genius. No he really is. He is solving high school math problems in the 3rd grade,
And that little James plays Behtoveen on the piano like it has never been played,
But you missed out on all his amazing talents and the best hug you will ever get,
Because you were too busy trying to impress your friends, not worried who you’d upset.  

It is time to learn there are a thousand better words than ******* or gay,
And most of y’all who use them don’t even know what they mean anyway,
So I will fight on to spread the word to end the word,
And no matter how many times they try and break us down,
I will never be deterred,
Because for the one’s I’ve known who are affected by this kind of speech,
For the kids I see every day, the students I teach,
I want them to live in the kind of place,
Where we give up hate and learn to embrace
So if you are with me, make the change today,
Buy a dictionary, find a better word to say.

I have been invisible before.
My thoughts and justifications were transparent.
All anyone could see were my actions;
the way I failed and stumbled,
and ran head first into doors that lead me down path after path of distraction.
At least they seemed like distractions,  
oh, but they become my destruction. 


I spent my time quietly imploding,
only to change my mind last minute,
and suddenly explode.
I changed my mind,
but my body stayed stock still.
I stood in front of the judges
and while my tongue was granite,
the urge to run from the podium had never been greater.

I wished to be invisible.
I wished to go to a dark corner of the room and finish my implosion.
Out of sight,
where I could hide and self destruct without a sound.

And then if,
or when,
I picked up the shrapnel,
I could re-join everyone on stage at graduation.

I could hold my head high
and with a smile,
pretend no one saw me crumble.

i give them my executables and
ask them to reverse engineer me
to look into my code for reasons
reasons that i'm not just broken
not just slow
not just bad

if these letters
on this line
mean
that i am programmed to worry
then it is not my fault
not my fault that
i have wasted years
years of my life in fear

it's just a bug
looping too many times
using too many clock cycles

my code may be broken, but
if it is broken
then i am not

maybe, just maybe
i am a good processor
given bad code.

not my fault.
no one could blame me.

it would mean
i do what i am told to
perfectly
quickly
efficiently.

but
what i am told to do is
buggy
unoptimized
inefficient

my programmers are lazy -
not me.

when i find
a function in my code
that never works
and they say
"that code is fine"
then why?
why does it never run?

something must be wrong with me after all
me, myself, the processor
i don't do what i am told

but no, no, no
i don't want that
i can't be broken, overheating, dusty
segfaulting
bluescreening
panicking

no!

the code must be wrong
it must be

so i look again and again and again
i lose myself in my code
i click and click and click
2x more and 2x more and 2x more
COMT and DRD4 and ANKK1
rs53576 and rs7794745 and rs1858830
lower risk and normal risk and higher risk
of the same thing
in me at once
conflicting
overwriting each other

there is no code to add risk objects
and no one knows
whether
they make a group or a ring or a field
or just
something
useless.

like dividing by zero.
you can...
but it's useless in the real world.
just like me.

i look for more code
for more functions
for more comments
more more more
give me more
take my rights
make me open source
as long as i can see me too.

602,000 lines are not enough
not when i run millions

stick your wires in my veins
take the code from my blood
decompile it
untangle it
i need to see it all

i need to know
that i am a good little processor
even if i am doomed to
forever
run BASIC and
a million GOTO statements
and ugly ugly spaghetti code
i am still good.

With the promise of being friends forever they parted.
40 years later the will to meet each other started.
All dressed up for the reunion, the tears rolled down.
As the health did not cooperate with the mind.
Then they remembered the party was uptown.
With the moan, they started to breakdown.
Then a flashback appeared.
The laughs, the pranks and the sensations.
One puts on a brave face and break fear.
From the wheelchair he gets up and calls the dear.
Says doesn't matter the disability, the friends will never out wear.
Get up o get up dear.
The one with low eyesight, calls for the car.
Says doesn't matter if I have to go far.
One by one all leave the fright and go with sparkle in their eyes.
40 years later, again under one roof.
The faces have changed but not the emotions.
Everybody remembers the good old days and promises that never failed.
The clown of the class again makes a joke.
The Romeo and Juliet of the class are still poked.
With funny thing in mind, they make a pact again.
This time to not meet but to get buried together as a team.

Don’t see only our disabilit-ease,
Don’t deny us basic facilit-ease,
Don’t ignore our many abilit-ease,
Don’t compound our varied difficult-ease,
Deal head-on with the harsh realit-ease.

You never know what life has in store,
You may fall one day and rise no more,
You may join our ranks, afraid, unsure,
You may write words to plead; implore.

We are not an alien race,
We have a voice, we have a face,
We have our part to play; a place.

Let us join life’s lively dance,
Let us have an equal chance.

Pl-ease.

ni Reagan A. Latumbo

Hindi man ako biniyayaan ng karangyaan,
O nakakain ng masasarap na pagkain sa hapag-kainan,
O nakabili at nakasuot ng magagarang kasuotan,
Kuntento naman ako sa lahat noong panahon ng aking kabataan.

Mahirap man ang buhay na aking pinagdaanan,
Milya man ang nilalakad ko noon marating lang ang paaralan,
Ipinagpatuloy ko pa rin ang pag-abot ng aking pangarap kahit na nasaktan,
Tiniis ko ang lahat dahil Siya ay nariyan.

Kahit na pandinig ko ay unti-unti na ngayong nawawala sa akin,
Nariyan pa rin si Ama at ako ay hindi Niya pinababayaan.
Kaya kahit ako man ay may kapansanan,
Naibabahagi ko pa rin ang aking talento at kaalaman.

Sa mundong aking pinapasukan,
Sa trabahong aking iniingatan,
Kahit bingi man ay marami pa rin akong natutulungan.
Mga baguhang empleyado ay aking tinuturuan.

May kapansanan ka man o wala,
Ang pagtulong ay hindi dinadaan sa usap-usapan.
Ito ay kusang ginagawa at pinaninindigan,
Maraming tao ang lubos na masisiyahan kung tulong mo ay hindi ipinagkakait sa kanilang harapan.

Bingi ka man o bulag o kulang ka man ng kamay o paa,
May sakit ka man sa puso o namanang karamdaman o wala,
Kapag tulong ang hinihingi, 'wag kang mag-aatubiling ipagkait ito sa iba,
Dahil sa bandang huli, ang iyong kabutihan ay masusuklian Niya.

say cowboy.
say hot dog.
say ice cream.
say baseball.
see, the step into the sound booth is an awkward height,
about 6 inches off the ground,
and i find myself raised on a pedestal,
sealed in for you to inspect,
watching you and an audiologist
through a glass window,
watching you decide my future
as you face away from me
so i cannot read your lips
and you cannot see me shouting stop.

say airplane,
say sidewalk,
say you might hear static in your right ear
but i know i will only hear a tone,
an electronic beep going on and on and on

say conducive hearing loss say sensoneurial damage say surgery say it might be permanent this time,
like it hasn't been permanent for the last ten years,
say there's a new technique say we can fix this,
say negative impact on social life, say poor classroom performance,
say we just want what's best for you,
say try hearing aids try CIs try cued speech,
say you need to be fixed.

it's been a decade since i first entered that sound booth,
noises not echoing off these walls that take a little more from me with every test.
it's been a decade since my hearing slipped away and
i am done mourning it but i don't think you are.

persistence is a valuable trait but stop trying,
stop putting me under with an x on my right cheek so the surgeons know how to lay me out on the operating table,
stop refusing to turn on the captions because i need the practice,
stop talking to me without tapping me first,
stop screaming at me when i mishear.

i am done mourning my hearing and i don't know if i ever grieved in the first place but you are still stuck in the stage of denial,
hoping against hope for some ******* miracle.
i don't want a miracle, i don't want anything god can give me because i am not lacking, i am whole, i already am the miracle you were looking for and i don't need to be fixed.

but you don’t believe that, do you?

so the audiologist can open the heavy soundproof door but i am still trapped inside this box,
the walls swallowing my words as you decide my future for me because
no one wants to listen to those who cannot hear.

say stop sign,
say hairbrush,
say push the button when you hear the beep
and i hold it down with my thumb,
gripping the clicker like the handle of a gun
until you tell me to let go.
but i hear deserts stretching away from me,
flat sci-fi dreamscapes where there is only one sound and i can hear it too.

say tinnitus,
say psychosomatic because you don't believe that i might hear infinity where you tell me i shouldn't.
say hole in the eardrum say the surgery might have accelerated the deterioration,
say we can try again but
i gave up ten years ago and i think you should too,
and i'm here in this sound booth screaming for you to stop
but you will not look at me,
will not even attempt communication.

no one wants to listen
to those who cannot hear.

My hand held out...
...to guard your back
When your friendships lacked
...to give money or supplies
When you couldn't survive
...to hold your hand
When you needed support
...to give you a hug
When you needed love
...to high five yours
At all of your endeavors
...to pat on your back
When you succeeded this or that
...to throw a thumbs-up
Because you never gave up

My hand held out...
...to cover my eyes
Through all of the lies
...to hide evidence
When you lacked common sense
...to understand the unreal
Amounts of items you'd steal
...to my chin to stipulate
The way you'd manipulate
...to cover my heart and divert
From your stories that hurt.

I could do this when I had two hands.
I could juggle these separate demands.
My dominant hand is limp now.
The tasks I take on are now simple.
I can only do one thing at a time.
Like, write out this single line rhyme.

When you see my hand out...
...from utter desperation
Please don't tabulate your accommodation
...remember I never asked before my disability
That you had previously admired my stability
...homeless, ***** and hungry
Offer to help me, without charging money
...keep in mind, it's the only one I have
My abilities and tasks all need to be halves
...perhaps don't act put-out or surprised
Because the person who's asking is paralyzed.