I bet Mona Lisa was neurodivergent.

I bet she arrived late,
wouldn’t pose without her weighted blanket,
and wasn’t even smirking.
But he painted one in anyway,
because he knew her soul smiled beneath her affect.

He knew her nonverbal presence spoke more
in oil paints, and I bet her hollow gaze was able
to hold his eyes only long enough to get the irises’ glint right,
though not so long that either could stand it comfortably.

There is a kind of precarious delicacy to accuracy,
to painting an accessible truth for an unwilling or unknowing audience.
Hear me when I say that we are not the only ones masking.
We are not the only ones turning icons into paint-by-numbers
and Mona Lisa into someone approachable who fits in the frame.

I bet Mona Lisa was neurodivergent,
an unmasked masterpiece we will never know.