


WALKING THE HALLS (OF CHILDREN’S HOSPITAL)
Look at me, walking outside of my body.
I try to name it: “FEAR,”
hoping once acknowledged, it will leave.
But fear is brilliant—and a jerk.
It doesn’t care if I name it or not.
It has all the time in the world
to question, to imagine, to shatter
PRETTY MUCH EVERYTHING.
It knows each crack and entry-point.
When I run into the bathroom to hide
it fogs up the mirrors with panic, so
I keep walking,—if you can call it that.
I keep moving—
until my body has driven itself home,
which no longer seems like home.
I keep not knowing what to do—
and find myself in a bathroom, again.
I lift a ridiculous lipstick to the mirror
and I begin to write.
(Saskia Kidd, Summer 2012 )


“I will make a way- I will provide the people.
I am watching over you, in your comings and goings,
when you wake up in the morning, and when you go to sleep at night.”

Dedicated to my brave and inspiring son.
And to all people living with chronic illness day after day;
often invisibly so.