AUTISM: A POEM

          XIX. On Learning of Our Son's Illness

The only sound we hear is that warm afternoon
          wind still sifting through the long arms of elms

everywhere around us.  We watch as our son
          runs alone across the grass, his figure silhouetted

now against sunshine slowly dying in the sky
          behind him.  Our own shadows are lengthening

along the lawn, drifting like little splotches
          of cloud cover, spotty knots of shade blotting

bits of landscape in that late light—as always,
          eventually seeming to link us with everything

we can see until nightfall once more gathers 
          all together in the false security of its embrace.

Even in such darkness, as the three of us return
          home, fears of what might lie ahead never disappear.

AUTISM: A POEM

. . . . . XVIII. At the Chapel

As late daylight moves through
. . . . . a few stained windowpanes, these walls

take on an appearance of murals,
. . . . . though printed mostly in paler shades

of primary paint. My son slowly
. . . . . guides one hand along the tinted images,

dipping his fingers into that palette
. . . . . of illuminations now brightening white

space before him—as if he is trying
. . . . . to test its temperature or in an attempt

to enter an alternative existence.
. . . . . His wide smile disguises apprehension

when he reaches to touch the green
. . . . . serpent twisting like some vine winding

around the brown bark of a branch
. . . . . toward its ruby fruit. And by the time

Alex grabs at the image—hoping
. . . . . to hold an apple, his whole arm tattooed

with a brilliant glaze—he is sure
. . . . . this world offers more colorful options.