Tito Rajarshi Mukhopadhyay - How Can I Talk If My Lips Dont Move?: Inside My Autistic Mind

Right now, I am thinking about a mirror. It was a mirror in one of the rooms upstairs, in the house where I spent my second and third years of life. The mirror was in front of a window, and it reflected the rocks of those sun-baked hills outside the window. I would stand in front of that mirror, not to admire the landscape in its reflection. I would not stand in front of it to see how well my hair was groomed either. I would stand in front of it because I believed that the mirror wanted to tell me a story. And I believed that the mirror wanted to tell me a story because I wanted to tell it a story. I would tell my story to the mirror, and the mirror would tell me back the story. I would think about a tilted sky surrounding those climbing goats on the hill. I would believe that the mirror heard my thoughts and would show me the tilted sky.

I was not able to talk when I was two or three years old. My stories were not meant for human ears. Human ears cannot hear anything other than sounds. But not my ears, as I believed then. And not the ears of the mirror either. I believed that if you cared enough to listen, you could hear the sky and earth speaking to each other in the language of blue and brown. And I believed that if you cared enough to listen, you could hear the walls of the room you were in, telling the floor not to stare at them, while the floor wondered, Where else should I look?

A language of white and red. The white of the walls and the red of the painted cement floor. The mirror heard everything. I knew that the mirror heard everything because only when I stood in front of it could I hear the walls and floor talk. Otherwise, why should I stand in front of it and wait for the open window to sing to the walls in the color of air? Only after I heard the silent voices, could I tell my story to the mirror. Stories with sounds of blue, white, red, or brown. Or stories with the colors of air.

One day, while I stood in front of it, I realized that it was easy to go through it and come out through it. And I realized that I could go in or come out only when the world behind me became transparent. Absolutely transparent. And where would all the colors of the world behind me go? I realized that the mirror would absorb all the colors within its own stretch of self. The blue sky behind the window would look bluer in the mirror. The sun-baked hills would turn browner in it. And I would look behind me to see the real sky and hill. I would be surprised to see them, colored with the color of air.

Stories waited for me behind the mirror. So I was needed on its other side. There was no great trouble to go through the mirror to the other side. All I needed to do was to stare intensely at any shadow on the corner of the wall as it was reflected in my eyes.

Voices of colors
And voices of shadows
Voices of movement
And their echoes
Voices of silence
Spun near or far
Through spaces and distance
Soaking my ears.

Real voices. I could be waiting behind a shadow listening to a story in red and green, when I would be interrupted by a real voice made of sound, thus dissolving the story of red and green. And then, to my utter horror, I would find myself surrounded by real voices. Voices made of sounds, on the real side of the mirror. The mirror would never reflect voices made of sounds. I, however, knew that it could if it tried hard enough.

If you try hard enough, you can talk, Mothers voice would tell me. Mothers voice would tell me that when no one was around and when she took a break from singing the same song many times over because if she didnt, I would threaten a temper tantrum. Mother had to be careful that no one was around because she did not want those women to smile at her for trying to explain things to a boy who had not even learned how to talk yet. Their smiles were the color of jaundice yellow, and that yellow was so dense, every color could be choked by its strength. I believed that Mother saw what I saw. And I believed that she was careful because she did not want to be choked by jaundice yellow either.

You need to talk basic words to him first, those voices would tell Mother. Basic words included a series of dada, mama, kaka, baba , and so on.

Only after he masters those words, will he be able to follow explanations like, Try hard to talk. I would hear their words in their voices of jaundice yellow.

I wondered which colors would go with basic words like dada, mama, kaka , and baba . So I would stand in front of the mirror and mentally say those basic words and wait for the mirror to show me their colors reflected in it. I soon realized that the mirror could not reflect the colors of those basic words.

Only after it masters how to reflect the basic words, will it be able to follow other explanations like, Try hard to reflect, I concluded.