Someone has commented on this poem:
“... I felt that the poem had found me out and identified both the major hurt of my early years and also the ‘moment’ of discovery, so to speak, when I realized the truth of it all ... the real pain was a manifestation of the openness of the heart, not being unloved.”
I was a very clever child and, frankly, I found school work boring. By the time I was twelve or thirteen I was causing problems by my disruptive and occasionally violent behaviour.
My adoptive father told me that he was going to take me to Court and have me declared “beyond his control”. He described in detail what would happen and said the judge would take me away from home and send me to a place where I would get some discipline.
Later that night I heard my adoptive mother screaming “You’re not to send her away, you’re not to send her away!”. So I knew he meant it, and I hated him for years, even though he never carried out his threat.
Later we somehow made it up, but my feelings for him were never the same. Something in me had died.