BOY

He sits silently,

his head slung low

on setsquare shoulders,

shrugs when questioned,

fingers wrestling with a pencil

like they're fighting for an answer.

His face turns up towards me,

saying loudly, soundlessly,
from tight-mouthed lips,
"Not me. Try someone else."

He throws a ball, small

and solitary, high into the air

at the edge of the pitch
where his friends battle
with a bigger ball, together.

He's lost somewhere between 

the sky and the smack of the ball 

as it hits his hand. His smile 

says everything. He's happy 

by himself, beside his friends.

He's fast asleep, 

lying on his side,

leg cocked, arm bent

beneath his quiet head,

curled around his thoughts.

Suddenly he springs, stands

and faces me, a grin hanging 

there between us, like the wave

he gave me once across the street,

a sign of the waves the man will make.