She Doesn’t Seem Autistic

How could other parents understand

she can’t regulate, can’t dress, screams in wind?

Their girls touch down, their modules steady, small footsteps

breaking the moon-sand’s surface, their milestones

cosmic miracles of the ordinary. We long

for their basic okayness, their assumption

that the whole team will walk on the moon,

get to jump, twirl in the applause, treasure the video.

With her characteristic heart and power, the winner of the Tim Thorne Prize for Poetry turns her attention inward in this new poetry collection, creatively illuminating her own hidden autism and that of girls and women, most of whom are misdiagnosed and unsupported in a medical system designed for boys. Every page will surprise and move you.

'With wit, artistry, compassion and determination, Esther unflinchingly shares her own truth and the truth of multitudes of autistic girls and women. Her poetry brings me to tears, but also to laughter and a deep appreciation of the beauty of the autistic mind.' – Dr Michelle Garnett PhD, co-author of Spectrum Women: Walking to the Beat of Autism

'Esther brilliantly engages with poetic form to create novel forms of language which make it possible to communicate the embodied experience and complex inner lives of autistic women.' – Joanne Limburg, author of The Autistic Alice

'A revelation, not just in terms of our understanding of autistic experience, but of what is possible within poetry. With unflinching honesty, piercing insight and formal ingenuity, Esther’s language blows apart the myths to clear a space for grief, solidarity and beauty. Be prepared to be shaken and embraced.' – Andy Jackson, Prime Minister’s Literary Award winner