I listened to a love song
Sang along like a prayer
Let my guarded heart feel something
I never have before.

Now the song echoes like an elegy
And a sinking spinning world moves on
without me.

I give you permission

to write that poem
even if it really isn't all that good

to tell that joke
even if you always mess up the punchline

to wear that outfit
even if those boots really don't go

to feel proud of yourself
even if you're only scraping by

to love yourself
even if you acknowledge your shortcomings

to accept yourself
even if you've told yourself that
everyone who respects you does so because they don't know everything

to be imperfect
even if you dream of being someone so great and feel like you're so small

I give you permission
to be a poem
even if it won't be a very good one.

I live in split reality
unreconciled duality
And wait with anxious, twisting hands
For someone to say they understand.

Oh, not too bad
(I haven't slept)
Y'know, on and off
(I mean this week I haven't wept)
It used to be worse
(I'm not in despair)
I'm holding up
(I won't let myself go there).
Some days are hard
(I feel so drained)
I think everyone's struggling
(I've numbed the pain)
Yeah, I'm okay
(I can't keep pace)
Thanks, I'm alright
(I miss my okay place).

"Everybody get down!"

Those were the words that started my day.
Running feet, closed lights, locked doors.
Don't panic. Don't panic.
Silenced phones and shaking hands.
Whispered assurances in a darkened closet.

Not a drill.

All is still.

A false alarm.

Hope is a thing with feathers--
TOO many feathers.
That flutter and flap inside me,
Threatening to expose
My crippling fear
That things may just get better.

I live in split reality
Unreconciled duality
I feel my mind and body split
I'm one part healthy, one part sick.

I struggle with my different roles
The things I can and can't control.
To be so alive, and still aware
I may never live a life without fear.

The doctors have no easy say
I take each moment as today
And wait with anxious, twisting hands
For someone to say they understand.

'How can I love him?'
She asks me--
Not for the first time.

Like I'm the patron saint of
Unlovable children,
Having embraced my place
as the central fulcrum
of Autism Wonderland.

She shows me a picture
and my heart swells and breaks
for the that little boy
Lost in his own little world.
His birthday bliss,
As, slowly reaching for milestones,
He doesn't know he's missed
reaching
The hearts of family
Who are supposed to love
Unconditionally.

'You know I'm not like that,'
She tells me,
Asking not to judge,
To accept her wholly,
The way she can't
Accept him.

Like two falling figures
We spin wildly out
Fingers not quite touching.

Like coordinating catastrophes
One good day one bad
Episodic endurance.

Like the consistent click-clack of a Newton's cradle
Colliding energies
Creating orchestrated consistency.

The scientists
and pragmatists-
mathematical analysis-
can say it all won't come to pass-


(probably.)