You don’t look autistic

“but you don’t look autistic”

isn’t the complement you think it is.

You’re twisting a knife under my identity,

scraping away the layers you don’t understand.

You can’t paint over my reality,

You cannot cut it down to fit

into the tackle box of misconceptions

you’ve built around autism.

You choose not to see it in me.

You laugh when I move my body funny

or think I’m doing it for attention.

You get mad when I don’t react

just as you want me to,

and wonder why I can’t just act “normal”.

I’m not normal enough for you but not autistic enough for the viewing of Rain Man projected on a loop on your brain.

As if the diagnosis itself doesn’t give you the answers you need.

Autism Spectrum,

A spectrum of a being amongst a spectrum of beings.