This year, we’re celebrating World Poetry Day by sharing 5 poems about dyslexia.
1. Dyslexia by AO
Ten year old AO created a poem in which you can read both forwards and backwards. The poem was posted on Twitter by the teacher and has since gone viral, receiving hundreds of thousands of shares and likes.
Firstly, read the poem forwards:
I am stupid.
Nobody would ever say
I have a talent for words
I was meant to be great.
That is wrong
I am a failure
Nobody could ever convince me to think that
I can make it in life.
Now read it backwards:
I can make it in life.
Nobody could ever convince me to think that
I am a failure
That is wrong
I was meant to be great.
I have a talent for words
Nobody would ever say
I am stupid.
2. Disobey Me by Sally Gardner
Sally Gardner, an award-winning British children’s novelist, has written many poems about dyslexia. Below is one of the poems titled Disobey Me. For more poems written by Sally Gardner, visit The Guardian.
They told me I was dyslexic
it didn’t describe me
belonged in the library
of words I can’t spell
no matter how many times they tell
you just try harder sound it out
simple when you think about
it. Stop giving me the third degree
don’t put me down
don’t make me fret
I can’t learn my alphabet
it doesn’t go in any logical order
the stress gives me attention deficit disorder
at school I wanted to go it alone
they told me that’s unwise
they called me unteacheable
I was unreachable
stuck in the classroom, broken by rules, by buttons and ties.
But I don’t like the little words they always disobey me
the does doses up and is higher than a dude should be
So they tested me
they corrected me
and found my results poor
and told me I wasn’t concentrating
they expected more.
I tried to get along
I never made the score
And I think about Chaucer in those freedom days
when no one found your spelling faulty for the extra Es and As
Mr Shakespeare I wonder would they let him write his plays?
Oh woe is me
might just be
graffti in a bog
And Hamlet the name
he called his prize-fighter dog
But I don’t like the little words they always disobey me
the doe doses dope and is higher than a do should be
You say that you’re a writer
but that’s absurd
how do you write
if you cannot spell the words?
listen, it’s not the way I spell
that makes me want to write
It’s the way I see the world
That makes me want to fight
I challenge you – see the words as I do
feel them sting your skin
the meaning often shocking
the way the nib goes in
to relish discombobulate not to moderate your passion
not to murder language in an artificial fashion
words are our servants
we are not their slaves
it matters not if we spell them wrong it matters what they say
But I don’t like the little words they always disobey me
the does doses dope and is higher than a dough should be.
3. Ghoti by Gregory Kearns
Gregory is from Liverpool in the UK. He is a published poet and works at The Brain Charity which helps people affected by neurological conditions including dyslexia.
I’m asked to read out names on awards night
at school. I’m reassured that I’ll be helped
to pronounce all the names that I can’t read.
The teacher points to my piece of paper
scaled from my nervous folding. This one’s
easy, say it as its spelt – So I do
and I’m wrong – over and over. So
I practice – even double-check the hard names.
It’s said like café and that helps until
my memory aid swims away,
and there, the slight smile of disappointment
on students’ faces as I get them wrong.
To think that I can spell fish: ghoti and pheti
the way I always read unite as untie.
4. Dyslexia by Teedy Dawn
Teedy Dawn’s poem about dyslexia reminds us of the struggles those with dyslexia face on a daily basis. You can listen to the poem below by visiting Poem Hunter.
It really is annoying when you can't read black on white,
You just get lost so easily because you can't tell left from right.
When words all look like pictures and letters jump around,
And mathematics baffles you because it has no sound.
I'm capable, articulate and speak with true conviction,
Yet it's written works and reading words that highlight my affliction.
Sometimes I worry silently, the fear just makes me sick,
I fear that people judge me because they think I'm ‘thick'.
So I offer up this silent prayer to ease my troubled mind,
Let others see me, as I am, intelligent and kind.
Please feel the struggle that I face each and every day,
Dyslexia is not a myth, it’s real and here to stay.
Alas, I know that faith alone will not bring understanding,
The world is fast, intolerant and always too demanding.
I realize no higher being will clear my mind of fog,
In which case, I have to ask if there really is a doG.
5. The First Bird of Dyslexia by Philip Burton
Philip Burton is a multi - award winning poet. The poem below was commended in The Poetry Society’s Stanza Poetry Competition 2020.
Morning has Broken, said the hymn
like the first morning; and (for me)
was unreadable even when pounded
out with heavy hammers
mor- / -ning / has / bro- / -ken
Teacher would perform the trick
of lifting a sound and a sherbet lemon
from a high shelf – mor, he would say –
cracking the sweet with his teeth
now you, now you…
– ning he would say
now you, now you, NOW YOU…
Each bit spoke for itself, I was told;
he showed his tongue and sweet fragments.
MOR- crack! -NING / HAS / BRO- crack! -KEN
a spine-touching nosedive of sound
scattering hanks of itself on the road outside.
Blackbird has spoken like the first bird
okay, but my spoke had a missing bicycle.
Nothing screamed from the page;
even when scratched by an adult fingernail
mor- couldn’t talk, -ning had no bell.
I couldn’t conceive of them leaping through eyes
into the brain, and out of the throat.
I hosted a dream of shapes and cyphers
that whispered, sneezed, clanged and blared
but none of them had any name, or if they did,
it constantly broke, broke again
like the first morning.
When told I was lazy or dull,
springing fresh from the Word
I perched my face on the loops and ascenders
of the wrought iron gate of the school
till morning mended.
Have you written a poem about dyslexia that you would like to share this World Poetry Day? You can email us info@dyslexia.org or tag us on your social media post!