Centering Neurodivergent Poets

If reading is another form of listening, truly attuning to an unfamiliar voice can be a means of transformation.

- By Brian Gresko

Since 1980 the nonprofit publisher Milkweed Editions has sought to engender just such change in readers, with the stated purpose of being “a site of metamorphosis in the literary ecosystem.” Milkweed’s titles—including Robin Wall Kimmerer’s best-selling literary phenomenon, Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants, and Aimee Nezhukumatathil’s acclaimed illustrated essay collection World of Wonders—showcase a diversity of genres and styles, many of them radical and experimental.

Now, with its new Multiverse series, Milkweed pushes even further into territory largely unexplored by traditional corporate publishers: neurodivergence. The series is devoted to publishing books that explore “different ways of languaging,” all written by neurodivergent authors. The series’ first book, The Kissing of Kissing, a collection by nonspeaking autistic poet Hannah Emerson, came out in March. It will be followed in November by nonspeaking autistic poet Adam Wolfond’s The Wanting Way, and, later, Aster of Ceremonies, by disabled artist and stutterer JJJJJerome Ellis.

Chris Martin, a neurodivergent poet and editor-at-large for Multiverse, developed the idea for the series in his role as a teacher-writer with Unrestricted Interest (UI), an organization he co-founded seven years ago to help neurodivergent learners, particularly autistic students, express themselves through writing. Martin, whose book about his pioneering educational work,