Going Out to Play In the World

Going Out to Play In the World
(an autistic journey)

I remember when my mind
used to bounce around
like a super-ball trapped
inside my lonely cranium.

That was the real world,
while outside places
were merely visited like
family, home and people.

Nature was special, it spoke
in ways I understood and liked
yet required nothing more of me
than to avoid stupidity and stay alive.

Fairies and leprechauns danced
in wooded clearances of rings;
possums and snakes were tamed
by mere gentle gestures and hands.

Sensations, comfort, predictability
drove me from bed and back again
without concern for future changes
for all was now and would be ever.

What brought me out I cannot say
for certain - save attentive parents
and a skilful speech therapist who
unwittingly convinced me she was real.

It opened the world to me anew:
people! boys, teachers, bullies, girls.
These forced me back inside at times
until I learned to deal with each in turn.

For years I held an abiding fear:
trapped again within myself
unable to project meaning beyond
the ceiling of my eyelids evermore.

The study of catatonic schizophrenia
terrified me - knowing how they feel
such intense experiences hovering
at the brink of this shared reality.

What kept me from speaking of it,
this age old struggle to emerge,
was shame, perhaps, but just as much
unknowing how to shape the thoughts.

Now in the lighter years this weight
still anchors me to the hidden past;
yet it has recovered memories for me
beyond the agony and fear of solitude:

- The soft commune with natural things
before forced adoption of expectations
overlaid acceptance with disappointment
that the fey no longer welcomed me in.

- Taking humor in the contortionist faces
discussing politics and religion when
I knew neither held power over me
before getting sucked into the mire.

Though I will never go back willingly
I regret that I left the key behind
and have no way to open the doors
for all others who remain imprisoned.