Try not

Try not to move your lips or slide your tongue along your teeth.

Surface tension transforms a tenuous slick on contact.

Try not to call yourself out in blame or shame.

And when your voice crackles like a live wire hold your jaw steady and bear the pain.

Try not to yodel in the forest. Vowels rolling in your throat multicolored marbles rumbling in a game, a multitude of sounds.

Try a nursery rhyme: A sing song chant.

The thrumming sounds of humming warms my throat I hear the voices, paralleled in harmony.

Try to sweetly sing along a warbling in your weakened voice, choking on the notes that bring you joy.

Did you measure up? Or were you silenced like a scolded dog.

Try to hold the hard, round candy, in your cheek.

A chipmunk bulge. Your tongue turns blue. You stick it out and make your brother cry.

He doesn’t need to learn To speak his mind or

Try to find his voice.