I watched fights,

Words used like animal bites,

Or in my bed, tucked up tight,

As it ignites,

Sleights,

All their spites,

Across nights.

I believe love to be a fickle thing,

For all I have known it to bring,

Is poison like a sting,

How pointless it is to declare it with a ring.

Divorce was a gift.

I felt the shift.

A mother with more life.

A father better without his wife.

One evening, years have passed,

An adult now; how time goes so fast.

I organise my memories and gifts from my past,

And stumble upon some letters that leave me aghast.

Where I knew of their endless fights,

Here I read of their honeymoon, watching the northern lights.

They write of their greatest joys over the year,

Where they do not have to fear,

For they have one another, so bright, so right.

And they are each others armoured knight.

And here is one,

Only recently done,

The seal open, clearly undone.

My father describes his most beloved,

The only woman he has ever loved.

His apology for being wrong,

For letting things slip,

For losing what kept him so strong.

He hopes she can forgive him, and have been able to find other kinship.