Refrain

Every day, it comes to me unbidden - several times, every day.
A sentence.
I wake him up for school, I walk onto his campus at the end of the day, I check on him in his room when he's on a time out...and it comes to me...
"I want my boy."
I let it be spoken in the hospital when he's coming out of surgery, when I'm on my way back from a teaching conference out of town, when he's right there beside me but seems a million miles away, a lifetime away.
I reshape the words so his sister feels included, but to me the mantra's still the same when I tell her every day, "Let's go get our boy."
The wanting is there even without the word, there so strong each time I mentally see the sign for want; I imagine my two hands clutching empty air and pulling it toward myself, emphatically.
When he is out of my reach, beyond my circle, the mantra rises up like some inborn reflex, as primitive and essential as breath.
Every day, countless times. My Boy.
I can't always have him though, and sometimes even when I do the yearning goes on.
For me, this is what autism means right now.