April 8th Poem on Autism Awareness Prompt in TSL's NAPOWRIMO given by
Ampat Koshy
1. Ma, do you remember that shop Thom's in Bangalore. You used to take me there. I would go and hug the refrigerated freezer where they keep all the ice creams. No one understood why except Dad one day when he came and hugged it with me. I wanted to feel the vibration running into and through me. Touch and feel matters a lot to me. Now you can no longer take me there or I touch and feel that, I am too big and they would not let me.
2. Ma, when we go to restaurants, people would look at me strangely when I took the food and smelled it. Don't they know that that is a very good way of knowing for my insides whether it is edible or not? Or lick it. They have lost this art which is olfactory and gustatory but I have not.
3. Ma, you and my sisters and Dad even would all sometimes cry when I bang my head on the wall till it bruises and even breaks into a lump on my forehead but it gives me relief somehow. Do you remember Temple Grandin's torture machine? It is like that. I don't feel the pain and you can't stop me at such times as it would not be safe for me or you. It is my hyposensitivity though it may be dangerous for my brains.
4. Ma, it is true that I am hypersensitive, sometimes a small light can be magnified for me a million times and a small sound. Sometimes music is piercingly sweet but sometimes coughs and sneezes make me go mad with anger. Some surfaces are rough to the touch and some soft as butter. I am swallowed up by a thousand keener sensations of sight, sound, smell, taste and touch that dance in me in a symphony of order and chaos than in neurotypicals and I have no language except body, face, and features and gestures to express it in/with. Ma, I like structure, order, peace, quietness and hate change and crowds. I like large places and spaciousness and huge houses and nature and soothing music.
5. Ma, crazy people want me normal and some want me like this even in other lifetimes and they are all crazy. I am not so different and I struggle to prove to you all that I am l, just like you all, and even my temper tantrums and rolling on the ground and all are only like that of other children.
6. Ma, I wish that there was no such thing called co-morbidities. As if this was not sufficient.
7. Ma, do you remember why they took me out of school. I used to feel claustrophobic in the school bus and attack others and they stopped me, even the special school could not include me due to my claustrophobia in going and coming. Do you remember how I used to bite my hand to not hurt others, Now I Don't do that Ma, I overcame.
8. Ma, when I used to go to ABA I was their star pupil and they would bring in parents to watch me. I was good at piano but my teacher left me. Only my niece and sisters bring my talents out Ma. Why is the world unable to tap my hidden strengths and powers? I am not a savant but I am not a fool either, I come from a family who are all high achievers and want to achieve something too. I just need the right kind of guidance. Ma, am I not the best cook and make the best dosas and am I not good at painting and drawing?
9. Ma, I am naughty and mischievous sometimes and like fun but do not like it when you cry unless I made you cry by being naughty. I get angry and frustrated and low and depressed and have mood swings just like everyone else but try to control it just like everyone else, Ma. Honestly. I love you and everyone and do not want to hurt anyone and don't now but don't know how to explain all this to the world.
10. Ma, I used to run off but somehow always returned, thank God. I am afraid if you all leave me what will happen to me sometimes. Are you afraid too what you will do if I leave you and go away? Earlier? To the place of no return?
11. Ma, all these labels don't mean anything of autism and spectrum and ableism and disability and being challenged, or retarded or mad or insane or crazy or anything, what matters is to love and be loved.
12. Ma, people don't know anything, they think I don't but sometimes I think they are the ones who don't. Mostly I am happy and music is my solace and the company of you and my siblings and caregivers enough though I and you all are rejected by society.
13. Ma, do you remember the pebbles I used to line up endlessly and neatly and the toy cars and the shoes? Why can't the world be like that, simple and orderly?
14. Ma, you have washed me and cleaned every part of me even as I grew to be an adult and taught me how to become self-sufficient in the house in all these things. How can I see God except in you? The way you have seen God in me.
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