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Joan Roger
Autoimmune Disease
We rest in sunlight
near a teal mountain lake.
Glimmers of light
on the water’s surface
and iridescent bigleaf maples
remind me—
I tend to my wailing ankles,
know they speak of limits,
while my son
on a nearby rock,
soars and crashes to earth
with careless elation.
How easy it would be
to curse the confines
of my body,
but just now, a grey jay
alights on a cedar branch
swaying in the breeze.

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