The Murder of Asperger’s Last Poet: The Poetry Legacy

By Douglas Gilbert

With the protection of an honorable designation of ‘high functioning’ Asperger’s Syndrome, the poet with some dignity and great effort, did manage to write a treasure trove of inspired poetry, but on the verge of achieving great fame and best seller status, the poet had the “high functioning”-status rug pulled right out from under him. With the slander epithet of “Autism on the wrong side of the spectrum rainbow”, nascent sales and dreams collapsed. The Fifth Edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual doomed Asperger’s Poetry: "Asperger's Syndrome" does not exist anymore; it is moribund. Although there is no gold at the end of the rainbow, there is still this legacy for study.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Feb 23, 2015
• ISBN: 9781312942141

Book preview

The Murder of Asperger’s Last Poet: The Poetry Legacy

The Murder of Asperger’s Last Poet: The Poetry Legacy

By Douglas Gilbert

Copyright © 2015 Douglas Gilbert

All rights reserved.

ISBN 978-1-312-94214-1

About the Legacy

With the protection of an honorable designation of ‘high functioning’ Asperger’s Syndrome, the poet with some dignity and great effort,  managed to write a treasure trove of inspired poetry.  On the verge of achieving great fame and best seller status, the poet had the high functioning-status rug pulled right out from under him.

With the slander epithet of Autism on the wrong side of the spectrum rainbow, sales and dreams collapsed. The Fifth Edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual doomed Asperger’s Poetry. The category of Asperger’s Syndrome was stricken from the manual.  The word Asperger’s no longer exists.  It can no longer be uttered in polite company.

Just as one can not go back to Constantinople , Asperger Poetry is dead and its most ardent proponent can not lift his head with honor.  There is no such thing as Asperger’s Syndrome any more.  It has been removed from the vocabulary just as in the novel "1984 by George Orwell where newspeak" was invented to reduce the vocabulary to prevent people from expressing thoughts against the Party line.

He must remain in the shadow of  the Autistic slander and never be expected to do well.

Although, Alice of Wunderkinderland says strat-tea-tackfully, every poem must have a pie thrown at it to lend it color and flavor, but

There are rumbles in the world where

every blade of grass cries, and

as we run through it,

it tries to comb the hair of our sorrows

Perhaps a few, though expecting little, will comb through these pages, and grow, or glow -- whichever comes first.

And however, he can still reveal a secret:  he has received an official communication from the League of Benevolent Galaxies.  Given his limitations, he was shocked to learn that he had been named the Poet Laureate of the Primitive Planets.  Secretary-General Chytchalrorix informed him that there was no stipend, but just a paper certificate, made from the pulp of their long extinct keypapx tree  engraved thus:

Poet Laureate of the Primitive Planets, (Milky Way Division), Category 15297xt7388: Backward and Primitive Planets

One can see why he would be desperate for substantial sales of these now slandered poems.  Asperger poetry is dead, but the obscure poet goes on from his isolation and sadness.  Without his name and honor he is effectively a mere dead metaphor.

The Adventures of You

I told you not to go to the South Pole

because I don’t want you to freeze

But your freedom is dear to me

and you are so happy with adventure.

I want you to be

gleeful with a dog sled,

race with the wind.

I think the angels

will warm you, and

professor lover dear

I love your research

of life, of snow, and

of me.

I will tell your peers, that

they must publish your papers

in a Journal, just because

I say you are worthy

of truth, and

the data is glorious:

let them look, and

if they give you a prize

I will be ecstatic for you,

but as I gift you with me

I hope you’ll duck into

the cloak room at

the Noble Prize ceremony

and kiss me, because

I love your work

Ink Doesn’t Laugh Anymore

I’ve canceled my trip to Paris

and I’ve given up my scholarship to Art School

given up on studying cartooning

Probably, I’d never learn to draw anyway, and

I don’t think the French would give me

a permit for a gun. When I applied

for Art School, I didn’t think I’d

need weapons more powerful than

La Plume. Feathers of speech

don’t seem very powerful enough

to tickle the Zeitgeist

My Love Is An Atheist by Diane

I tell you:

you must believe in Heaven

because when you die

I don’t want you to

forget me, and

my dear atheist

I don’t want you to end

I want you to continue

with me forever.

Give me your hand, and

I will comfort you at your death bed.

I like beds

as you know

So in the snow

can we watch the flakes

flow like angels

you don’t believe in

But you believe in me

and I will lift you

because I love you.

Take my hand before you die.

Pardon an aside:

Oh my God please

welcome my friend

who I recommend, and

if need be

I will give

examples of love

for me and many

and when he dies

could you comfort him.

I beseech You for a miracle

because I love him as he is

And now my dear

can I tell you

that you will die, but

I’ve made a reservation for you

in a very fine establishment

that I think you will like

Wait for me though, 'cause

I don’t want to surprise you too soon

Don’t despair; I care. Just,

wait for me, my love, because

I will seize you abundance

that you will love in surprise.

So many fair things I will bless for you.

Just wait and don’t be sad because

I'll gather these gifts from my heart.

I don’t know why you would die, but

wait for me because

when I come, I'll

bathe you in my

stunning love

Giraffe

There is a giraffe who reads my words for me

stands up tall because she loves me like a high leaf

She has a reading every Friday at the club

and they love her because she is so beautiful

and she is so slim and long necked, yes!

She is so cool when

she reaches high

and reaches low

She has no stage fright and

her heart beats true always for me;

I think she can throb for me

without a worry about her heart

except if she would think I would not kiss her neck, but

I would and would all over

and even take her hand for

an innocent walk in the woods

just because I want to

share the moon with her

and do a silly howl or

a lullaby for a Friday night

when she comes home with me

high on applause but

waiting for me to clap

and I do of course, because

we will turn many leaves indeed

just like we always knew some day

we would learn to speak

the language of love like

the necking of the Sun and the Moon,

light on a leaf of belief standing tall.

Eating Tornadoes

I’ve heard a tornado can lift a

herd of cows into the air

(besides the houses)

But when it lifts scratching cats

tears out potatoes,

out onions from the ground, and

out with flour from the warehouse,

it rains potato pancakes,

and when those hungry people

at the end of the emergent rainbow

catch mash in a hot frying pan,

deliciousness is cooked, and

it’s fresh like a fork in the road

Quirky Perfect

Sometimes you make me feel magical and

I love how you think I have

a beautiful way of doing things.

Sometimes for a microsecond I feel perfect, and

you seem perfect to discuss a symphony and sing with me.

Maybe there’s a perfection cake to taste together, and

I’d share the strawberries with you.

Many times you seem perfect for the moment, but

I can’t promise any feeling is reality; I can only say

I love the moment, love how

I imagine you as if we could be quirky perfect.

Hell No I’m Not Going to Edit This Much

No, I refuse absolutely

to use few words; no, no, no

there is no soul in brevity

No, no, no, I don’t want to be spare,

I want to be naked. I want

to show you everything, and

I want to show you that every ugly blemish has

a beautiful poem it’s inspired, though sometimes

it has named itself like a star is named 123087274

by the Astronomical Union sometimes but

more often is called Sarah. No, not at all, I

want many more words. I want Love. I want faith in poetry.

I want every rhyme to sing

in every octave that could ding-dong.

I want to hear my music, my love, my joy.

I want to be extravagant, lush in words,

lush in feeling. I don’t want to coyly

take away anything at all except you, love,

into my hovering dreams with chatter fluff

until there'd be no cloudy words

but justly a masterpiece of Love.

Avian Translation

I’ve always wanted to speak

to the smaller birds, so

I’ve done a lot of weird whistling

Sometimes a little birdie cocks her head

and tries to see if I’m a threat or a bird benevolent,

but I’m neither a mate nor predator, just

a conversationalist

So I whistle something which means

give tomatoes to Owls, like Caesar.

And she says, "Huh, what? And

for a Human you don’t look so bad

even though you have no feathers.

Why is it that you can’t fly?

It’s so easy."

And I said, "Why is it that

you can’t speak and write novels."

Well, then, it said, have you written one lately?

And I said, Um, no…

And it said in a way that I think it meant kindly that

I was a birdbrain.

Ode to Sloopy

Oh my neighborhood is blessed,

so sweet the streets, but yet

I mourn where you were,

where I saw you down the other road:

down and out town where I never

could seem to be for long

forlorn and never understanding

your faithful path; I watched

the caresses paved on

bumpy roads, your skips

on tangled streets, without

any proper signs but caution

and sorrow, and

I could have loved you

so easily if you were in

my class at school, and

my illegal notes would have said

I am not fulfilled with

just my toys. Joyce dear dream,

with the pony tail and smile,

could you play with silly me like

you’ve always loved me

on the streets of true love.

Sometimes I think

you’ve known me

But now that

I’ve grown

now that I moan

can I give you my map

to find me, though there’ve

been so many years?

There’s a song and I say Hello

Joyce babe, oh

you’ve known the song so

don’t fall off the mountain;

hang on to an edge,

hang on to a love to be

that should have been.

Oh baby I don’t know why

your Daddy put you down

and why you stayed with cockroaches

in your sorry part of town

Oh baby, can you cross the border,

and don’t be down,

’cause there’d be no disorder

if you’d wait for me on the corner,

only wait for me where

we would have loved the sky

on a street of love, and where

we could have walked forever, but

now I’ll call you a cab into heaven

’cause I know there’s a cliff

where everyone dis’s you

But baby don’t fall;

I’ve got the rockin’ gear

and the pinions of a mountain climb

I know you’re on a cliff, but

hang on

I will hoist you up to God, and

maybe He will share you with me

because I want to save you, and

my rescue ropes are of joy. We will

cross the border

and climb a better mountain

beyond outrageous stones

those devils throw

How can they know

your kind heart

if they’d be mocking birds.

Let me sing to you of

sweet rescue, because

don’t we both need to

climb to a heaven we need

so desperately

I think we are good

to hang on for love

because never would I

want you to be anywhere

but on my street if

you love me, or

even if you don’t.

Foamy Dream

There is an ocean at dawn

that skirts the night tides

crashing swirls and sea birds

There is a froth to morning dreams.

I've been staring at foam in my coffee

remembering the ocean starring in ending rain

a conjured dream of frothy us, stars

beneath an oceanic drink of dawn

It was

coffee boiling hot for

the exigency of a dream, and

when from the freezer I plunged

an ice berg scoop of ice cream in it

the titanic foam made giggle bubbles

that speak of the dream when

you laughed your dainty blessing,

so pretty your voice, your smile in

the swirl of your skirt like a current

or maybe I just imagine such formality

like the majestic blue of the ocean at sunrise

because you know I don't mind your bikini too,

love the virtues of shallow laughter-water,

know that the splash and the play

do pull tides from the deep imagination

I can be hot

to be cool

and we sat on the white sand

under the silly white umbrella we had borrowed

not imagining rain on our white beach, where we thought

if only sunshine would be in the heart then joy rises

for sunrise at the beach is

a glistening foam

silver crests

deep blues

an orange glow

and ice cream foam

and I dream of you

with fireworks in the sky

because...

maybe I imagine love

blue and foamy

silvery crested

What Used To be In New York City

The winter is darkly sad here:

the roads are closed for snow,

the subway is not running.

I can not go to Broadway

because the Plays are suspended

and the Long Island Railroad

is hiding.

I remember there used to be a snowball,

the play used to go on

and there was flaky suspension.

They can’t even scrape the rails:

used to be that a scrape

and a scab was nothing.

Everyone sang in the snow

hitched a ride on paradise.

I miss the day