Laid Low
I used to run round on a big wooden ball
when I was much younger and fit
but now I can barely stay standing at all.
I've enough trouble trying to sit!
I stagger and stumble all over the place
and my hands do whatever they please.
My words come out slowly, forced out of my face,
as if they're determined to tease.
I lie on my bed while the universe tilts;
a beached whale in t-shirt and skirt.
What just walked across me, a man wearing stilts?
No, only the cat, but it hurt.
So what's brought about this unfortunate state?
What happened to make me this way?
Did a witch cast a spell? Was it something I ate?
No, 'twas something I did yesterday.
I went to the doctor, he gave me some pills,
he said they could help me, the creep.
I took just the one and it gave me the chills,
made me nauseous and sent me to sleep.
For more than a day now I've slept on and off;
it's been twenty eight hours so far.
I haven't the energy even to cough
and I've rarely felt quite so bizarre.
Never again will I take his advice!
I'll stick with the stuff that I know.
The herbs that I take may not work in a trice
but they've never yet laid me so low.
I think I should add that this state of affairs
made me stagger for over a week.
But now I've recovered - just one of life's scares -
and my future's no longer so bleak.
© 2004
As an update it’s worth mentioning here that I had aural hallucinations that started the day after I took that pill and that lasted for almost a year. Not good.