Tag: #autisticrespect

April is Autism Awareness Month. But that’s wrong. We don’t need awareness. We need acceptance.

We need acceptance of the Level 3 autists with significant challenges.
We need acceptance of the Level 2 autists with fewer challenges.
We need acceptance of the Level 1 autists, like me, with fewer challenges than a Level 2 autist—but challenges nonetheless.

We need acceptance simply because our brains are built and wired differently. It is in our DNA; every cell of our body is autistic. We cannot be anything but autistic.

And to us? Neurotypicals—allistics—are the weird ones who don’t make sense.

If you can’t accept that, then at least recognise the equity you deny us. Recognise the social cohesion that is lost in the absence of equity and inclusion.

But back to regular business.

The Chiaroscuro Anthology is a collection of 19 poems, published here throughout April. (If you want everything all at once, there’s a PDF.)

And now—the writer’s statement.



Light alone is shapeless. A flood with no shore, a dawn without contrast. It spills, uncontained, flattening all into a seamless glow. There is no form, no edge, no texture—only a blinding sameness.

Darkness alone is abyss. A void that swallows, erasing all it touches. It stretches infinite, consuming definition, devouring meaning until nothing remains but an echo of absence.

Between them—chiaroscuro. The whisper of shadow against skin, the ember in the midnight hush. Here, light sharpens into something more than mere brightness; it carves faces, silhouettes, stories. Here, darkness finds its purpose—not as oblivion, but as contrast, as depth, as the place where light reveals itself most truly.

What is the light without darkness?
A glare with no soul.

What is the darkness without light?
A silence with no song.

But together—
Together, they paint a world.

Together, they paint an autistic world.


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The Chiaroscuro Anthology is my contribution to Autism Awareness Month. It is not just poetry—it is my autism laid bare, in shadow and light.

This is my rage at the world’s expectations.
This is my grief for what was lost.
This is my discovery of what was always there.
This is my unification of self.

Each piece is a reflection of contrast, intensity, and depth—the way I experience the world. Chiaroscuro is not just art; it is how I exist.

This is my applied phenomenology