A Poem Called "Burden"

Burden,

by theamazinJ

Am I a burden?
Am I broken?
Am I a problem?
I am leading my own life.
I am a director of my own services.
I am doing whatever I can for myself.
I am trying to feel whole
even with too many see me as broken.
Many people look at me
with dismay and horror
because I seem different,
well, Hello, I am different,
I am disabled, I am Autistic,
I am the person I am,
the way I was born to be,
and most importantly
no one can interpret me
as a burden,
as broken,
as a problem that needs to be fixed.
I am very caring and loving,
I have a mind that is beautiful,
I have a heart filled with gold,
I have a soul as old as the world itself,
but a burden? A real burden cause you see me as different?
A burden because I am disabled?
As disabled as many people in this society are,
belonging to the largest minority group
that grows and grows every day,
where our society does not accept
and our society just wants to fix for their own judgements
and their own way of creating a social construct
and their own way of editing the human race
as if we are not already a person
as if we are not already living
like none of us can make the right decisions
and especially if the person is disabled
like disability means the person is automatically incompetent,
and the disability really is not a part of the culture of humanity,
the human spectrum is strong,
the human spectrum is a wide array of differences and disabilities,
yet, no one wants to say it the way it is,
everyone rather euphemistically
use words like differently abled, alternately abled, special, and
stare at people who are different
as though the person is really a burden,
is really a problem, and really needs to be fixed and
constructed with the universal domestication.
Humanity is a spectrum.
Humanity is real.
Humanity has free will.
Humanity has our own minds.
We are in the human race for a reason in order to reason, question, and analyze.
I am a director of my own services, a boss, and leading my own
because I'm equipped with the mind I was born with,
no one was born with my mind,
they were born with their own,
and from that, the experiences they lived with their own mind all along.
And, to someday, we all have the choice if we choose to find a partner
and from that we all have the choice if we choose to make our own family
and from that we decide to teach our own or other children what we know
and what we want our children to know.
Someday I hope to be a husband, a father, a uncle, and eventually a grandfather
and even more so if possible, a great grandfather
teaching wisdom and teachings to children of my own.
I am 38 years old now.
Being a husband, a father, a uncle, a grandfather, and a great grandfather
takes great responsibility and integrity and partnership and how much you want it
regardless who you partner with and why you partner with the person you want to be with.
Some people don't want that and are pleased with themselves
living by themselves,
and the love we have is to treat every person with dignity,
not as a burden, not as broken, and without the entitled feelings
that someone may feel insulted, rejected, and hurt
if their child does not do exactly what they want
and exactly how they wanted their child to be based on their own ideas.
We have 2 choices:
Live with entitled pride and ignorance and cynicism.
or Live with humility and wisdom and a open mind.
We are not a burden.
Everyone is a human being.
Everyone needs to understand each other.
Everyone is whole.
We pray. Every morning and every night.
And, we pray for parents, we pray for siblings, we pray for ourselves,
we pray to be whole,
and we pray for understanding and acceptance.
Prayer is just a statement of what we want and nothing more.