The Story Behind the Poem: “Cerebral Palsy” by Aleah Graff

Aleah Graff is the author of “Cerebral Palsy,” a poem featured in the Every Voice poetry contest.

Aleah Graff and a friend were at a local restaurant. When it came time to order their meals, the server took her friend’s order, then nodded toward Graff as she asked her friend: “And what would she like?” As always, Graff took the high road and politely ignored the unintentional slight. As someone with cerebral palsy, this was not new to her. She says, “My physical disability is quite visible but I am naturally quiet and introverted so it leads people to assume things about my cognitive ability. But I also need to evaluate my own assumptions if I start thinking that my needs are too much for people. In reality, most of the time they are more than happy to help and include me.”

Graff’s first prize winning poem, “Cerebral Palsy,” is a testament to the challenges she overcomes on a daily basis as she navigates a social morass that others simply skim over. In her poem, she personifies her disability. It is as though CP is a dance partner she has been arbitrarily paired with, a partner who can be clumsy, cruel and unpredictable.

Graff is the community engagement coordinator at Avondale United Church in Stratford and uses poetry and writing as a medium for education about her disability.

“I want to help people be seen when they are not so easily represented,” she says. As she grew up, she wasn’t seeing people with disabilities represented in books and media as other minority groups were. “It is important that young people see people who are like them.”

Her first memories of reading poems come from Grade 2 English class: “I had a wonderful teacher who sat us in a circle, read poems to us and encouraged us to write our own. I started writing that same year at age seven or eight. I needed surgery so wrote short poems for fun while I recovered. I based them on children’s books but rewrote the endings, not necessarily happier ones!”

Graff studied English and creative writing at Brock University and now writes poetry or fiction whenever she has time. She often listens to music while she writes which she says helps to inspire her: “In my poem, I want to emulate how the song makes me feel.”

Graff further explained:

“I’ve learned to let my poems sit for a while before I show them to other people. Often, when I write a poem, I’m so excited to say what I have to say that I just let the words explode onto the page and it’s a bit of a jumble. When I go back to the poem a few days later, I’m able to think about it more structurally, and play around with the lines to make sure that I feel like they fit the tone I want to evoke.

“My experiences with cerebral palsy have shaped me into the person I am today. That’s not a good or bad thing; it just is. Cerebral palsy is as much a part of me as my brown eyes. My experiences, worldviews, my life and the things that comprise who I am do not exist separately from my diagnosis but rather alongside it.

“I wanted to write a poem that personified cerebral palsy. I felt like this was a healthy, cathartic way to deal with my frustrations and thoughts. As a 20-something, I sometimes feel frustrated and angry that my body doesn’t work the way that I want it to. It was important to personify the thing that I am frustrated or angry with. That made it easier to convey the emotional toll that a congenital physical disability can create. Still, cerebral palsy is a spectrum. No two people experience it exactly the same way. I wanted to show someone who may be dealing with similar circumstances to mine that they are not alone.

“With this poem, I tried to show what having a disability means for me as a young person, particularly in social situations. It does not stop one from dreaming, having goals, achieving great things or being loved. Although I may experience frustration, anger, sadness and disappointment, my life is in no way whatsoever tragic. My life isn’t always easy, but nobody’s is.

“I have a fantastic mother, father and brother who go above and beyond to support me. They too have had to be resilient. I have great friends and great community support. I have a job I love, working alongside people who couldn’t be any kinder. It’s really important to me that people know one can be lucky in unlucky circumstances. And I really am lucky; I’ve never had to go through anything alone.”

The Story Behind the Poem is an ongoing series by Mark Hertzberger featuring conversations with poets recognized in this year’s Every Voice Poetry Contest and published in the anthology, Roots Through Stone: Poems of Strength and Resilience. Copies of the anthology are available for purchase at Fanfare Books in Stratford.