The Life Of Another Boy Poem by Robert Rorabeck

When the day is far away—and all of the laughing children
Have burned like candles into their moats—
And the alligator's eyes are as rubies instead of blind diamonds,
And you little sister's chicken pox recedes to the smells of
Night blooming jasmine:
And your mother drives home from spending all day
With a man who is other than your father,
Kissing his mouth right near the reservoirs of albino crocodiles:
How will you crawl in to be with them:
What door or hole will you enter—and what macabre games
Will you play with the defeated knight you find in there:
Abandoned to all of the false reasons of your childhood
Underneath the ceiling fan—as the jasmine perfumes
The reptiles,
And a mermaid courts in the life of another boy of whom you
Are sure you cannot believe.