Simon Basset

Some letters are written to be kept, not delivered. This is one of mine. I write these for other people now. Here is one of my own.

---

You taught me that a raised voice is the only voice that counts. I spent thirty years answering you in silence, which is its own kind of shouting.

I catch you in my hands. When I go quiet instead of saying the warm thing, that is you. When I keep score. When I decide someone will leave before they get the chance, that is you wearing my face.

Here is what I will not hand you: the last word. I will not be cruel and call it strength. I will not confuse fear with standards. I will not pass the worst of it down and call it inheritance.

I do not forgive you. I am not sure that is the point. The point is that I get to choose what I carry forward, and I have chosen.

You do not get a reply to this. That is the whole idea.

---

That is a never-send. If you have one of your own, that is the work I do: I write the letter you mean to write, for the person you cannot say it to. [email protected]

Letters for what you keep meaning to say. Write to me: [email protected]