The sort of kid other parents wished they'd had:
calm, content, caring, quiet -
his name might sound almost familiar.

After his mum shouted at the eldest for putting his hand
up the neighbour's skirt, and doors banged, and glass broke,
he made her tea, held her hand
while she disintegrated on the sofa.

The rows then became more frequent: his brother had found drugs;
his sister, an older man. He,
by getting on with his homework, found
he could avoid being shouted at, could avoid
having to compete for attention.

When her husband forgot to invite her
to the new year's eve party, he swept up the glass
she said she'd dropped, and, at midnight,
they shared champagne from a coffee cup
while she sat at the window, staring at the storm.
But that is not what this is about.

He fell in love - it was an overwhelming thing -
at fifteen while changing for PE;
he had tingles he knew he could keep only as secrets.
Cursed with the insight
that creates torment in poets, battered
by more than mere adolescent longing, he wandered home
to find the front door window broken, his mother in tears.

Just before Christmas he decided to write
it all down, decided to let the words tumble without restraint,
like the products of a storm. He knew
that it was the most significant letter he'd ever write;
understood, when it was done, that loving alone
is not enough; that having it read would destroy him.

When the noises became nasty, he'd read it again,
trying to curl up within the sentences, as if that
alone would save him. Yet, each time the shouting rose,
he'd hear their voices reading his words, and something,
sometimes the very thing, would sound wrong, ring false, and

he'd scratch it out, as if that would make them go away.
The letter gradually disintegrated, clichés crumbled and everything that could be mocked, removed. What remained oddly resembled a poem, something only the receiver could appreciate.

He posted it. On New Year's Eve he
drank champagne with his mum after receiving
a rude call from a boy who made his flesh tingle.

But that is not
what this is

about.