Author: Doreen O’Neill

I have dyslexia.
My thoughts have always been…
those of an artist —
but they don’t always
come out clean.

Sometimes they rush.
Tangle.
Freeze.
Or scatter across the page
before I can catch them.
But they are still mine.

I see in pictures.
Feel…
everything.
Taste the weather.
Carry music
in my chest.

My mind is a film,
a painting,
a long run
through fields
with ideas
flying past.

I’m neurodiverse.
I think differently.
That doesn’t mean I’m broken.
That doesn’t mean I’m less.

I remember —
being a child
in school —
tiny hand gripping
a big blue biro
in my LEFT hand.
And a teacher…
placing it firmly in my right.
Telling me,

“Write properly.”
But I couldn’t grasp it.
That’s why now,
I use both hands
to write
my truth.

So why —
when I use AI
to shape my thoughts —
do people act like
I’m cheating?

Do you shame a runner
for using a prosthetic leg?
No.
You cheer.

AI helps me express
what’s already there.
It listens.

Sorts my feelings.
And helps me give them form.

The school system
never knew what to do with us.
It measured spelling —
not soul.
It didn’t see the art
burning in our right-side brains.

I’ve always loved art.
Music.
Mary Oliver’s The Journey.
Beethoven.
Jazz.
Unbearable Lightness of Being.
Running.

Now —
I walk in wild places…
and feel

every
leaf.

Would you tell Einstein
his spelling made him small?
Or Frida Kahlo
her pain didn’t matter?
Would you say
my way of thinking
isn’t valid
because it moves
in colour?
In texture?
In story?

This…
is still my voice.
No less.
No weaker.
Just wired…
differently.

And now,
finally,
I have the tools
to let it sing.

Quoted From Doreen: I’m a 60-year-old writer and spoken-word poet with dyslexia.
Words have always lived inside me—more as images, textures, emotions—than in perfect grammar or spelling.