#tender points

[monachopsis-11]

Me wondering if I have Fibromyalgia VS the dog stepping directly on a tender point and making me literally scream.

[cvpio-dissolvi]

Amy Berkowitz, Tender Points (2015)

[fbdirectory]

The locations of the 18 tender points that comprised the 1990 American College of Rheumatology criteria for fibromyalgia.

[lifeinpoetry]

It’s only when the pain is severe or when the pain prevents me from doing something that I’m forced to think about it. But even when I’m not thinking about it, it’s still there. 

My body is washing dishes and it’s in pain. My body is on hold with California Blue Cross Blue Shield and it’s in pain. My body is dancing and it’s in pain. My body is Skyping Beth and it’s in pain. My body is taking a shower and it’s in pain. My body is riding BART and it’s in pain. My body is politely saying no and it’s in pain. My body is reading a book and it’s in pain. My body is at work and it’s in pain. My body is writing this and it’s in pain. My body is walking to meet you and it’s in pain.

— Amy Berkowitz, from Tender Points

[whenidiehallelujahbyandby]

Doctors are cops Self-select into the profession like a disease That will never be diagnosed Because its name is health And its smell is soap Walk around swinging their clubs Talking too loud Killing people all the time (It’s their job so it’s fine) And who can argue with a stethoscope

Amy Berkowitz, Tender Points

[lifeinpoetry]

The problem is / You can’t put pain on trial

— Amy Berkowitz, from Tender Points

[lifeinpoetry]

Suddenly the air conditioning cuts out And in its absence I hear a familiar growl 

The growl I do when I’m feeling comfortable Enough to feel alive 

I know I have a terrible power I identify with the ocean i.e., I could kill people just by being myself 

My growl recedes as if pulled by a tide  I smile

— Amy Berkowitz, from Tender Points

[lifeinpoetry]

Poetry fails me because it’s not written plainly. Its oblique nature aligns too closely with the slippery and unreliable speech that women have been associated with since ancient Greece. 

In “The Gender of Sound,” Anne Carson writes, “Woman as a species is frequently said to lack the ordering principle of sophrosyne.” Sophrosyne is a masculine virtue: the use of moderation and self-control in speaking. 

While men speak with order, Carson observes that “the women of classical literature are a species given to disorderly and uncontrolled outflow of sound— to shrieking, wailing, sobbing, shrill lament, loud laughter, screams of pain or pleasure, and eruptions of raw emotion in general.”

— Amy Berkowitz, from Tender Points