Poem, “A Boy with Huntington’s”

I was afraid for you
As you twisted your face
With your cupped hands,
Your right foot jabbing
The unsuspecting wall.

Arguing with the opposing day,
You said your dervish prayers
To Shiva of the dancing arms
To stay your frantic legs
And thighs buzzing like bees
In a lidded jar

How would I hold you
In sweet contentment?
After, in your feathery calm,
You were like a lazy lizard
Sleeping on drift wood
Or a string snapped from a shoe
Laying limp on a wood floor
Too tired to talk
As you gazed into the
Summer glaze of daffodils
And castles along the Hudson River,
Watching impish, howling cats
And two spastic squirrels
Darting across telephone lines,
One running from love.