A Portrait of the Autist - Dan Bull

I’m awkward, can’t talk to anyone

I fall at the first hurdle, it hurts to get it wrong

My mind’s wired a different way to everyone else

So I might seem strange, and be left on the shelf begging for help

Placed in a position in which I’m desperate now

Ashamed of my condition when I’m meant be be proud

It’d be great to fit in and blend with the crowd

Without a red face, a sense of dread;

I’m trembling now

I like things a certain way, a pre-determined order

And it disturbs my thoughts if the certain order’s changed

Uncertainty unnerves me, close the curtains over the windows

It’s a curse, Asperger Syndrome

We ought to stick around

Be autistic and proud

We ought to stick around

We ought to stick

I don’t notice faces in open places

My focus phases out and goes to blazes

And an overloaded brain is no way to be social and say hello to mates, is it?

It’s made me feel alone for ages

Because I know there’s no hope to change it

To most a face is an open page -to me it’s closed, the prose erased

And how am I supposed to behave

When nobody’s taken a moment to show me the way?

But it’s OK

I still hope and pray the status quo can change

And I still scope the skies waiting for blokes in capes

And I’ll fly when I know how I’m supposed to behave

So won’t you take a moment to show me the way

Autism assisted me in becoming a poet

Because I feel deeply but I just struggle to show it

I care for those around me though I don’t know how I’m supposed to tell people

So I wrote it down, prepared my vocal sound

Then shared my opus on open ground

Those with this syndrome are endowed with a determination to succeed

That the non-Asperger brain often fails to achieve

And yet we go off the rails easily, but believe me

I’ve seen what we can be when we’ve got dreams to reach that no-one else can

And piece by piece the diagnosed’ll find the folks to help them

To aspire to the heights their sights are focused on

I know it’s a long fight but we’re the type to go the whole hog