by Luna Lindsey
There is not enough written on Asperger's and love.
I am used to making my own things.
When I used to imagine what drugs felt like,
I thought they must feel like falling in love.
I was wrong. Drugs were a disappointment.
When I imagine what heroine feels like,
It must feel as good as being in love,
Or better.
Elsewise, why would anyone bother?
When I wonder if I'm happy,
I often decide I must not be.
Because I assume that all good feelings
must be as overwhelming as my bad
Else they must not be real feelings.
When I am in love, I am in love fully,
or not at all.
Depends on the day.
Depends on whether I've decided to love you.
Or maybe it's out of my control.
It means I had to teach myself to express love
in ways that you could understand.
It means I have to learn to hear love
when you express it the way you know.
I am always learning someone else's language.
Waiting for the feelings to be steady and permanent
and as powerful as my bad feelings
all the time.
As trustworthy as my bad feelings.
As consistent.
As conjurable.
This poem needs an ending
but an ending never comes.
No bookends or closed parentheses.
The answers never materialize
in a satisfying end of file.
My heart is never open,
For when it opens, it will bleed.
But it never completely closes,
either.
This is powerful, Luna. This line about love and translation of emotion struck home to me:
ReplyDelete"I am always learning someone else's language."
I could write a whole other poem or two from that one line. Which is why I wish more were written on Asperger's and love. I don't want to figure this out through trial and error anymore.
DeleteI love this line - Waiting for the feelings to be steady and permanent and as powerful as my bad feelings. Why is that bad feelings seem so more real and permanent? - Just asking myself that too - and the love ones seems so momentary - for me I have to focus (be in the setting) just to feel it and then I get easily distracted from it so it just leaves.
ReplyDeleteI know exactly what you mean, Julie. I'm still trying to unlock that secret myself.
Delete"As trustworthy as my bad feelings" -- there's the fish hook for me. I know those are real. I know where the bottom is. Everything else is malleable, fragile, fleeting. Does that distrust cheat us out of joy or just make joy an experience on a broader spectrum?
ReplyDeleteIn my case, it cheats me out of joy. Because the pain is so sudden and so intense, it feels like I must remain guarded to prevent it.
DeleteI'm learning to balance that, to find better ways to guard myself, besides just closing my heart completely, like I used to do.